Selected
Canadian Social Research Organizations (II)

Groupes
de recherche sociale au Canada (II)

NOTE : "Social Research Organizations" has been split in two to keep
file sizes reasonable - there's no special significance to the placement
of an organization on these pages

On this page, you'll find information about :C.D. Howe Institute - Canada West Foundation - Council
for Canadian Unity (Centre for Research and Information on Canada) -
Federation of Canadian Municipalities - Fraser Institute - Montreal
Economic Institute - Institute for Research on Public Policy - Institute
on Governance - Intergovernmental Committee on Urban and Regional Research
- International Development Research Centre - policity.ca - policy.ca
- Policy Research Initiative - Social Research and Demonstration Corporation
- Frontier Centre for Public Policy

To search the complete
Canadian Social Research Links website ,
use the text box below:

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are now reading,
use Ctrl + F to open a search window.

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NOTE : The essay below appeared in the IRPP's
Policy Horizons Essay in April 2015

Canadas welfare state needs transformation,
not more tinkeringhttp://irpp.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/2015-04-09-news-release.pdf
News ReleaseApril 9, 2015
Montreal  As changing demographics, globalization and rising income inequality
bring the future of social policy to the forefront of public debate, a new essay
in the IRPPs Policy Horizons series argues that an entirely new framework
is needed to replace Canadas outdated welfare state. Social policy expert
Peter Hicks warns that fine-tuning the existing system will not be enough to
fix the architecture of Canadas social programs. While he does not disagree
with recent calls to enhance access to child care, pensions and pharmacare,
Hicks argues we are missing the basic point  Canadas social policy
framework must be modernized to meet new realities.

The Enabling Society
By Peter Hicks
IRPP Policy Horizons Essay
April 9, 2015Summary :http://irpp.org/research-studies/policy-horizons-essay-2015/Complete essay : (PDF - 477KB, 48 pages) : http://irpp.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/policy-horizons-2015.pdf
Excerpt:
"Hicks ... proposes a fundamental restructuring of Canadas income
security system. Specifically, he recommends reconfiguring the system around
three pillars:
* providing a relatively modest guaranteed annual income to prevent people from
falling through the cracks;
* refocusing social insurance programs (such as employment insurance) on the
core mandate of providing income replacement during periods of unemployment
or disability; and
* creating a new system of lifetime accounts that will allow people to take
greater control of planning and managing their learning, work, caregiving and
leisure."

Source:
Policy Horizons
Institute for Research on Public Policy (IRPP)http://irpp.org/

More on this topic
from the Fraser Institute:https://www.fraserinstitute.org/studies/an-introduction-to-the-state-of-poverty-in-canada
Click the link above to access the following articles and reports:
*** Income Mobility: The Rich and Poor in Canada - by Herbert Grubel
*** Generosity in Canada and the United States: The 2015 Generosity Index
- by Charles Lammam, Hugh MacIntyre, Feixue Ren
*** Our continuing obsession with inequality, by Christopher A. Sarlo
*** To tackle poverty, we must first distinguish between temporary and persistent
spells, by Charles Lammam, Hugh MacIntyre

Comparing Government and Private Sector Compensation
in British Columbiahttp://www.fraserinstitute.org/research-news/display.aspx?id=22135
By Jason Clemens et al.
January 20, 2015
With heightened interest in how wages and non-wage benefits in the government
sector compare with those in the private sector, this study estimates wage differentials
between the government and private sector in British Columbia. It also evaluates
four available non-wage benefits in an attempt to quantify compensation differences
between the two sectors.
- includes an executive summary and an infographic showing how much better off
government employees are than people working in the private sector in many respects.

Complete study:

Comparing Government and
Private Sector Compensation in British Columbia (PDF - 1.2MB, 39 pages) http://goo.gl/wlScN4
The study is divided into three sections. The first reviews past research comparing
the compensation of public and private sector workers. The second presents and
explains the wage comparisons between the private and public sectors (broadly
defined) in British Columbia. It also presents a summary of the methodology
employed to compare and calculate differences in wages between the two sectors.
Finally, the third section compares available non-wage benefits such as pension
coverage, the age of retirement, job security, and absenteeism, to ascertain
the likelihood that there is also a premium for non-wage benefits in the government
compared to the private sector.

Source:
Fraser Institutehttp://www.fraserinstitute.org/
The Fraser Institute's vision is a free and prosperous world where individuals
benefit from greater choice, competitive markets, and personal responsibility.
[Especially the personal responsibility part - Gilles.]

----------------------------------

Related link
from PressProgress:

Fraser Institute wonders if a good job
with good pay and a good pension is "fair"?http://www.pressprogress.ca/en/post/fraser-institute-wonders-if-good-job-good-pay-and-good-pension-fair
January 23, 2015
Is a job offering a good wage, good benefits and a pension at retirement a bad
thing? Many would say that sounds like a sound strategy to fuel the middle class
and protect purchasing power in retirement. But one free-market think tank questions
whether that's "fair." A new report from the Fraser Institute probes
that question by comparing public and private sector compensation in British
Columbia in 2013.

"Is it fair that a private-sector worker
working a similar job as a public-sector worker is getting paid less in terms
of total compensation?" asked Charles Lammam, the Fraser Institute's associate
director of tax and fiscal policy, and one of the authors of the report.

---
Comment by Gilles:
HEAR, HEAR!
[So just how *did* The Fraser Institute avoid being audited by the Canada Revenue
Agency again??]
---

Idea of guaranteed annual income appealing
but implausible for Canadahttp://www.fraserinstitute.org/research-news/news/display.aspx?id=22084
News Release
January 6, 2015
VANCOUVERDespite the conceptual appeal of a guaranteed annual income,
the idea isnt likely to become reality in Canada, finds a new study released
today by the Fraser Institute, an independent, non-partisan Canadian public
policy think-tank.

Guaranteed Annual Income's Obstacles
'Insurmountable,' Fraser Institute Report Argueshttp://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/01/06/gauranteed-annual-income-canada-fraser_n_6423646.html
January 6, 2015
The idea of a minimum annual income for every Canadian could provide a more
efficient alternative social safety net, but reform is an unlikely and unrealistic
option, according to a new report from a conservative think tank. The Fraser
Institute report The Practical Challenges of Creating a Guaranteed Annual
Income in Canada," released Tuesday, said the country could benefit from
administrative savings and efficiencies by moving off the current multi-program,
multi-jurisdictional social welfare system to a single unconditional cash transfer
under the guaranteed income system.

Two Views of a Guaranteed Annual Income
: Segal vs Fraser
A retired Tory senator says it's the best way to alleviate poverty. The Fraser
Institute: Not so much.http://www.thetyee.ca/News/2015/01/06/Guaranteed-Annual-Income/
By David P. Ball
January 6 , 2015
For many, New Year's resolutions might involve hitting the gym, volunteering,
or spending more time with family. For recently retired Conservative Senator
Hugh Segal, one goal he's tried for 45 years to attain is a guaranteed annual
income for lower-income Canadians. This New Year is no different.
(...)
The idea (...) is to provide an automatic top-up to people's income if they
fall below a particular basic-needs threshold. Advocates say it would replace
and improve on the current provincial welfare approach -- which often claws
back payments if recipients find even part-time employment.
(...)
With a federal election on the horizon sometime this year, Segal hopes another
campaign cycle doesn't pass without poverty on the agenda.

Living for All: Ideas to End Povertyhttp://thetyee.ca/Series/2012/05/15/Ideas-To-End-Poverty/
By Katie Hyslop
This three-part Tyee Solutions Society series explores the pros and cons of
three of the most widely advocated proposals to put an end to poverty: the living
wage, a guaranteed annual income, and government wage subsidies

Right-wing Fraser Institute now claims it
is not right-winghttp://www.pressprogress.ca/en/post/right-wing-fraser-institute-now-claims-it-not-right-wingSeptember 8, 2014
Everything you thought you knew is wrong. Up is down. Down is up. And now the
right-wing Fraser Institute says it has no ideology except Truth itself. That's
right. The think tank says it shouldn't be characterized as conservative because
its work is "not value-based, it's driven by data." Fraser Institute
president Niels Veldhuis made the comment in response to queries from the Toronto
Star about whether the charity was under audit by the Canada Revenue Agency.

Veldhuis declined to say, even as the Harper government
finds itself under increasing pressure to explain why dozens of charities with
a track record of being critical of conservative policies find themselves the
targets of political-activity audits by the CRA. One of the groups, the Canadian
Centre for Policy Alternatives, is being audited in part because the research
and education material on its website appears to be "biased" and "one-sided,"
CRA records show.

So let's focus on what Veldhuis did say about
values, data and the institute, whose tagline is full of coded words to let
the world (hello Koch brothers!) know where it always comes down on the issues:
"A free and prosperous world through choice, markets and responsibility."
To help underline the point, click the link above for four Fraser Institute
graphics posted on its Facebook page (and cross-referenced with a sampling of
research findings) that illustrate how data-driven its work really is.

In a nutshell:
* Regulations are bad. Always.
* Taxes are bad. Really bad.
* Freedom is good. Really good. Always really, really good.
* Polluters of the world unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains!

In other words...

Up is now down.
Down is now up.
And the Fraser Institute conducts value-free, data-driven research.

Got it?

Source:
PressProgresshttp://www.pressprogress.ca/
Advancing progressive solutions for Canada with hard-hitting news and analysis,
PressProgress cuts through the day's political spin with facts and an informed
point of view. From punchy blog posts to a daily web roundup to spread news
and views, PressProgress is a must-read to spur positive change.

Each Canadian taxpayer owes $243,476 as total government
liabilities reach $4.1 trillionhttp://www.fraserinstitute.org/research-news/news/display.aspx?id=21020
News Release
April 1, 2014
VANCOUVER, B.C.Government liabilities include much more than direct debt,
and when all federal, provincial, and local government liabilities are combined,
each Canadian taxpayer owes $243,476, notes a new study by the Fraser Institute,
an independent, non-partisan Canadian public policy think-tank.

Source:
Fraser Institutehttp://www.fraserinstitute.org/
"Our vision is a free and prosperous world where individuals benefit from
greater choice, competitive markets, and personal responsibility."

-------------------------------

Later that same day, from PressProgress:

Canada Pension Plan Investment Board to
Fraser Institute: you're wrong about public pensionhttp://www.pressprogress.ca/en/post/cpp-investment-board-fraser-institute-youre-wrong-about-public-pensionApril 1, 2014
The Canada Pension Plan Investment Board isn't mincing words. The crown corporation
established in 1997 to invest the funds of the CPP says the Fraser Institute
is just plain wrong about the health of the nationally administered pension
plan. Or, more specifically, shows a "fundamental lack of understanding
regarding the CPP."

The right-wing think tank based in Vancouver recently released a report, claiming
that if you add up all the liabilities of every Canadian government  federal,
provincial, and local  every taxpayer would owe $243,476 (of the $4.1
trillion total) in direct debt and unfunded liabilities.

The Fraser Institute's report cites an unfunded liability existing at the CPP
of $792.3 billion, and goes on to suggest future generations of Canadian taxpayers
will feel either have to pay higher taxes or receive lower benefits.

Not so fast, says the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board...

Source:
PressProgresshttp://www.pressprogress.ca/
Advancing progressive solutions for Canada with hard-hitting news and analysis,
PressProgress cuts through the day's political spin with facts and an informed
point of view. From punchy blog posts to a daily web roundup to spread news
and views, PressProgress is a must-read to spur positive change.

CPP Investment Boardhttp://www.cppib.com/en/home.html
Our mandate is to invest in the best interests of Canada Pension Plan contributors
and beneficiaries and to maximize investment returns without undue risk of loss.

The Geneva-based International Labour Office (ILO)
[ http://www.ilo.org/ ] , governed on a
tripartite basis by governments, employers and labour, is reporting [see ILO
report link below] "serious flaws" in four recent IMF papers, based
on their use the data from the Fraser Institute's "index of labour market
flexibility" and "in the way they are used."
(...)
We eagerly await a more balanced approach from the Fraser Institute.

Source:
PressProgresshttp://www.pressprogress.ca/
Advancing progressive solutions for Canada with hard-hitting news and analysis,
PressProgress cuts through the day's political spin with facts and an informed
point of view. From punchy blog posts to a daily web roundup to spread news
and views, PressProgress is a must-read to spur positive change.

Source:
International Labour Office (Geneva)http://www.ilo.org/
The main aims of the ILO are to promote rights at work, encourage decent employment
opportunities, enhance social protection and strengthen dialogue on work-related
issues. The unique tripartite structure of the ILO gives an equal voice to workers,
employers and governments to ensure that the views of the social partners are
closely reflected in labour standards and in shaping policies and programmes.

---

Also from (or rather about)
the Fraser Institute:

The Fraser Institute and the Koch Brothers

By Gilles:
Remember a few years back, when the Harper Government launched an all-out
assault on environmental groups (NGOs) allegedly financed by "foreign-backed
radicals"? [ http://goo.gl/b5yd2p
] I don't recall any similar vendetta against the Fraser Institute for presenting
itself as a "charitable organization", despite the fact that the
Fraser has accepted a half-million dollars over a four-year period from the
Koch brothers [see link below], American oil barons who stand to gain $100
billion dollars from the Keystone XL pipeline deal.

Koch foundation donated again to "charitable
organization" Fraser Institute in 2011, U.S. tax records showhttp://www.vancouverobserver.com/politics/koch-foundation-donated-150000-fraser-institute-2011-us-tax-records-show
By Jenny Uechi
October 31, 2013
The Charles G. Koch Foundation has donated $150,000 to the Vancouver-based right-wing
think tank Fraser Institute in 2011, according to U.S. tax records. The funding
was for a report, which now seems to be a key part of a larger Koch campaign
promoting "economic freedom".
This is the fourth year of funding for The Fraser Institute by the Koch Foundation.
[During those four years,] Fraser received total $625,500 [according to U.S.
tax records] from the Koch Foundation.
(...)
The Koch brothers are hard-right libertarians who co-founded the Tea Party to
promote an agenda of reducing government and lowering taxes. They have donated
over $100 million to conservative causes and climate change denial, and have
invested in Canada's oil sands for over 50 years.
(...)
...the Fraser Institute has been a proponent of oil sands development and the
proposed Keystone XL pipeline, both carrying enormous benefits to the Koch
brothers, who stand to gain an estimated $100 billion from the Keystone XL pipeline.
[bolding added]

The Fraser Institute: 100% political and
still a registered charity!
Explain, please...
By David Climenhaga
February , 2012http://rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers/djclimenhaga/2012/02/fraser-institute-100-political-and-still-registered-charity-expl
Other than Canadian political parties themselves, the Fraser Institute must
be Canada's most intensely political organization.
Notwithstanding its pious mission statement -- "to measure, study, and
communicate the impact of competitive markets and government interventions on
the welfare of individuals" -- essentially 100 per cent of the Fraser Institute's
activities are 100-per-cent political.
(...)
... as Nova Scotia Finance Minister Graham Steele put it: "The Fraser Institute
produces junk.
It is not a serious institution. It is a political organization."Source:
rabble.cahttp://rabble.ca/

An Oldie Mouldie from the Georgia Straight:
Stephen Harper and The Fraser
July 6, 2006

Harpersteinhttp://www.straight.com/article/harperstein-0
By Donald Gutstein
July 6, 2006
Stephen Harper was a 15-year-old student in Etobicoke's Richview Collegiate
just west of Toronto when MacMillan Bloedel chairman Jack Clyne and other corporate
leaders chipped in a total of $75,000 to start the Fraser Institute in 1974.
(...)
Three decades later, in October 2004, the Fraser Institute held its 30th-anniversary
gala celebration --- 30 years during which business and conservative foundations
pumped more than $100 million into Fraser activities; 30 years during which
Stephen Harper rose from high school to University of Calgary student to Reform
party policy chief to head of the National Citizens Coalition and to leader
of the official Opposition.
(...)Credit the Fraser Institute? Harper probably thinks so.
(...) Like the Fraser, he is dedicated to the ideas of Friedrich Hayek, leader
of the Austrian School of economics. Margaret Thatcher was an outspoken Hayek
devotee. Hayek urged reducing government intervention in people's social and
economic lives to a bare minimum. No social programs, no environmental or consumer
regulation. In Hayek's world, government officials do not serve the public.
Instead, they are self-serving empire builders. As Ronald Reagan said, government
is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem. 

The State of Ontario's Indebtedness
(PDF - 1.4MB, 66 pages)http://www.fraserinstitute.org/uploadedFiles/fraser-ca/Content/research-news/research/publications/state-of-ontarios-indebtedness.pdfJanuary 31, 2013
Jason Clemens and Niels Veldhuis
The essays collected for this publication are designed to provide readers and
particularly those in Ontario a better sense of where the provinces debt
stands today, the expectations for the future, and warnings about the likely
costs of inaction. Part of the motivation for this publication was the lack
of genuine response to the much-heralded report of the Commission on the Reform
of Ontarios Public Services, or what became known as the Drummond Report,
named after the chair of the commission, Donald Drummond. Simply put, the conclusions
of the Drummond Report should have been a wake-up call for the Ontario Government
regarding the immediate need for reform of the provinces spending. Instead,
the government has chosen to try to simply slow the rate of growth in spending
over the next few years without any serious reform.

Source:
The Fraser Institutehttp://www.fraserinstitute.org/
The Fraser Institute motto:
"A free and prosperous world through choice, markets and responsibility"

----------------------------------------------------------

Reality check from the
Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives:

Repeat After Me: Ontario is not Greecehttp://behindthenumbers.ca/2013/01/31/repeat-after-me-ontario-is-not-greece/January 31, 2013
By Trish Hennessy
The Fraser Institute has a new report warning Ontario could become the next
Greece or California because of the size of its debt. Of course we know Ontario
is not Greece or California, and such comparisons are disingenuous. But it is
possible that Ontario could find itself in a similar mess if it follows the
Fraser Institutes standard issue prescription for government financial
management: more public spending cuts, more public sector layoffs, and more
tax cuts.
(...)Repeat after me: Ontario is not Greece, nor should it
make the same mistakes as Greece. Its time to move on. Its time
to define our own agenda, a post-austerity agenda, and truly put Ontario on
the path to economic recovery.

"Why polar bears and not elephants?"
and more from Canada's hyperbolic Tory senatorshttp://goo.gl/Pf8yg
April 25, 2012
By Alexis Stoymenoff
A debate continuing this week in the Senate over foreign funding of environmental
charities has so far brought out some shockingand creativerhetoric
from both sides of the floor. Over the past couple of months, Conservative Senators
have drawn heavy criticism and scrutiny upon some of the most respected environmental
groups and charitable foundations in the country, including Tides Canada, the
David Suzuki Foundation and the Dogwood Initiative.

Though not all Conservatives are in agreement
on the inquiry and its motivations [ http://goo.gl/adf7i
], some Senators have come out with aggressive arguments that demonstrate the
restrictive political environment these charities are now working within. To
help illustrate the battle being fought in Ottawa, this article offers selected
key points from previous Senate transcripts.

---

Charitable Fraser Institute
accepted $500k in foreign funding from Koch oil billionaires.
In four years alone, U.S. Tea Party architects the Koch brothers poured half
a million dollars
into Canadian right-wing think tank, the Fraser Institute. http://goo.gl/YZ7QC
April 25, 2012
By Alexis Stoymenoff
As the Conservative assault continues against Canadian environmental charities,
the Vancouver Observer has learned that since 2007, foreign oil billionaires
the Koch brothers have donated over half a million dollars to the charitable
right-wing Fraser Institute. (...) The grants were purportedly for "research
support" and "educational programs".
(...)
The Fraser Institute, described by rabble.ca as Canadas most intensely
political organization, is a registered non-profit focused on economic
and public policy research. The groups work is often seen as controversial
(which they boast about on the website), and is generally in support of conservative,
small-government, free-market values. While the federal government and pro-oil
lobbyists have taken aim at environmental charities for allegedly violating
the Canadian Revenue Agencys legal limits for political activity,
the Fraser Institute and its charitable status remain unquestioned. And as the
Koch Foundations tax data shows, theyve received a significant amount
of foreign funding to help influence Canadian policywhich
is precisely what environmental groups have been accused of doing.

The Fraser Institute claims to be non-partisan
and non-political, and denies that it undertakes lobbying activities.
However, critics cite examples of its blatantly political endeavorslike
publicly calling on the government to change election spending laws, or pushing
provinces to adopt right-to-work legislation.

NOTE
: The links below will take you further down on this page to a description of
and link to each organization and, in most cases, selected site content.(Please wait for this page to load completely if the links below
don't seem to work at first)

Think-tanks
changing their mindsMany
top Canadian policy-makers are moving on. Maybe it's time for a bit more edge
or relevance, reports CAMPBELL CLARKAugust
20, 2005OTTAWA -- A generation of influential Canadian policy-makers are moving
on. They're not politicians or bureaucrats, but the heads of think-tanks, the
deep thinkers sought out for fresh ideas by government leaders. It is part of
a widespread rollover that is leaving Canada's think-tank sector at a crossroads.
Even some of the current crop say the field may be strong but it could use something
more -- a bit more edge, a little worldliness, or a touch more relevance -- to
fill a market of ideas undersupplied by a sterile political debate.(...) The think-tank
positions certainly have influence. Brian Guest, a former senior aide to Paul
Martin who left the prime minister's office to co-found the Canadian Centre for
Policy Ingenuity, which deals with the issues of cities and the environment, said
his interest in think-tanks was sparked because he had to keep up with Mr. Martin's
demands for arguments about their papers or perspective from someone such as Ms.
Maxwell."Source:The Globe
and Mail

Canadian
Centre for Policy Ingenuity (CCPI)"The CCPI is a non-profit organization
that solves significant social, economic and environmental problems by applying
systems thinking to policy development and activation." - someone from
CCPI contacted me by e-mail to ask me to post a link to this site --- although
there's not really much content on the site yet except for the full text of the
(above) Globe article, which I found interesting enough to share. [- an "About
this Site" page would be very nice...]

Fraser Institute
- "Competitive Market Solutions for Public Policy Problems"The Fraser Institute was founded in 1974 to redirect public attention
to the role markets can play in providing for the economic and social well-being
of Canadians.Our vision is a free and prosperous world
where individuals benefit from greater choice, competitive markets, and personal
responsibility. Our mission is to measure, study, and communicate the impact
of competitive markets and government interventions on the welfare of individuals.

This site is very rich in
Canadian conservative content.Here are a few samples
of what you'll find on the Fraser Institute's site, along with some different
perspectives from groups that reflect *my* philosophy more than the Fraser Institute
does.

NOTE: When I did a linkcheck in September 2009,
most of the Fraser Institute's links were broken.
I've fixed some of the key links, but I've removed some of the dead links. If
you wish to access a link that's broken, Select and Copy the title of the page
you wish to see, then paste the page title from your clipboard into the Fraser
website search engine on their home page. I was able to find those key links
fairly easily, so give it a shot.

Sample content from the Fraser Institute website:

Kochs in Canada: Fraser Institute co-founder
confirms 'years and years' of U.S. oil billionaires' fundinghttp://goo.gl/uSta6
April 26, 2012
By David P. Ball
(...)
Koch Industries is responsible for 25 per cent of Canadian oil sands imports,
or roughly 250,000 barrels a year, to the United States. With heated rhetoric
in recent months about US funding for Canadian environmental groups  such
as the David Suzuki Foundation and the Sierra Club of Canada  nearly 16
per cent of the Fraser Institute's own funding comes from sources outside
Canada, according to the group's 2010 Canada Revenue Agency return. Those
foreign donations  totalling more than $1.7 million in 2010  are
significantly higher than both David Suzuki Foundation's and the Sierra Club
of Canada's.

Immigration
and the Canadian Welfare StateMay 17, 2011
By Patrick Grady and Herbert Grubel
Abstract:
This publication provides an estimate of the fiscal burden created by recent
immigration into Canada and proposes reforms to existing immigrant selection
policies to eliminate the burden. It uses a 2006 Census database to estimate
the average incomes and taxes paid on these by immigrants who arrived in Canada
over the period from 1987 to 2004. It also estimates other taxes they paid and
the value of government services they absorbed. (...) To curtail this growing
fiscal burden from immigration, the study proposes that temporary work visas
be granted to applicants who have a valid offer for employment from employers,
in occupations and at pay levels specified by the federal government and determined
in cooperation with private-sector employers. Immediate dependents may accompany
successful applicants. The temporary visas are renewable and lead to landed
immigrant status if certain specified employment criteria are met.

Complete report:

Immigration
and the Canadian Welfare State (PDF - 4.2MB, 62 pages)
"We propose changes in Canadas immigrant selection process that are
not anti-immigrant, but are instead aimed at replacing the present failed system
with one that uses market forces to select immigrants and thus to determine
the level of annual inflows."

---

COMMENTARY (by Gilles):

If you start a conversation with a statement like,
"Well, I'm no xenophobic ideologue, but...", chances are that you
are a xenophobic ideologue. The authors "propose changes
in Canadas immigrant selection process that are not anti-immigrant..."
- to which I would add "...well, perhaps not anti-ALL-immigrants --- just
anti-poor immigrants." Welcome to the Era of The Harper Government .

---

I didn't know whether to laugh or cry when I found
the source reference below.

"The 2006 Census public use microdata file
on individuals contains 844,476 records, representing 2.7% of the Canadian population.
These records
were drawn from a sample of one-fifth of the Canadian population (sample data
from questionnaire 2B)"

Questionnaire 2B is the long
form Census questionnaire.
That's the one that the Harper Government  replaced with a voluntary survey
that, according to the experts, won't be worth the $30 million cost.
Welcome to the Era of The Harper Government .

The Fraser Institute Produces Junk: Graham Steele (Nova
Scotia Finance Minister)
By Alex Boutilier
September 13, 2011
After delivering an update on Nova Scotia's 2011-2012 budget forecast,
Finance Minister Graham Steele was asked what he thinks about a new
report from the Fraser Institute that ranked Premier Darrell Dexter
first among sitting Canadian premiers in terms of fiscal restraint.
(...)
The Fraser Institute produces junk. It is not a serious institution,
it is a political organization. And it is no accident that their focus
is on the Ontario election (Premier Dalton McGuinty came second last).
They're trying to make themselves relevant to the Ontario election.
It is no accident that the three premiers they rank at the bottom (PEI's
Robert Ghiz, McGuinty, and Quebec Premier Jean Charest) are three non-Conservative
premiers who are up for re-election right now. So the next time the
Fraser Institute issues something that has Nova Scotia at the bottom,
remember that when they put us at the top, my answer is still: the Fraser
Institute produces junk. It does not deserve any serious consideration.
[Speaking directly to the interviewer:]
Remember that the next time you ask me about something else the Fraser
Institute produces, that even when I could say 'yes, this is validation
of what we're saying.' It's ... it's crap.
Source:Metro News Halifax

Think Tanks
and the Propaganda Machine
December 5, 2010
(...) Name any issue that social justice organizations, community and church
groups and unions have fought for over the years and [Big Business] wants the
opposite. But Big Business cant just come right out and press openly for
these things so instead they set up a mouthpiece  the Fraser Institute
 and get right wing academics (e.g., Christopher Sarlo) to publish papers
that support the Big Business viewpoint. And suddenly there you have it Peter
Mansbridge quotes them on the National.
Source:Operation Maple - Take Back
Canada!
Operation Maple is a social media project developed and produced by a team of
people who want to communicate the message that the people we elect to represent
us do not have our best interests at heart. They put big corporations ahead
of regular Canadians...

Fraser
Institute - Home page
The Fraser Institute is an independent non-partisan*
research and educational organization based in Canada.
"(...) The Fraser Institute is a registered non-profit organization. We
depend entirely on donations from people who understand the importance of impartial
research and who support greater choice, less government intervention, and more
personal responsibility."
[ * Yeah. And monkeys might fly out my butt.
]

Birds of a feather?

See the Fraser Institute's Other
info sources page for links to 20 institutes around the world with a
similar focus to that of the The Fraser Institute --- "A free and prosperous
world through choice, market and responsibility". It's the Fraser Institute
motto, the short form of which should be "Survival of the Fittest".

And while we're on the subject...

The
Fraser Institute - from SourceWatch
Wikipedia-style article, unfortunately somewhat dated, but still offers insights
into the connections between the Fraser Institute and its corporate masters.
- includes links to similar articles about other front
groups shilling for corporate interests in Canada, such as the Atlantic Institute
for Market Studies and the Frontier Institute for Public Policy.
Source:SourceWatch
The Center for Media and Democracy (CMD)*
publishes this collaborative, specialized encyclopedia of the people, organizations,
and issues shaping the public agenda. SourceWatch profiles the activities of
front groups, PR spinners, industry-friendly experts, industry-funded organizations,
and think tanks trying to manipulate public opinion on behalf of corporations
or government. We also highlight key public policies they are trying to affect
and provide ways to get involved.

[ *Center
for Media and Democracy (CMD)The Center for Media and Democracy is an independent, non-profit, non-partisan
media and consumer watchdog group that focuses on a number of areas, including
Investigating and countering P.R. campaigns and spin by corporations, industries,
and government agencies about issues and products that affect our health, liberty,
economic opportunities, environment, and the vitality of the democratic process.
[ About CMD ]

Canadians
Celebrate Tax Freedom Day on June 6June 5, 2009 On Tax Freedom
Day, the average Canadian family has earned enough money to pay the taxes imposed
on it by the three levels of government: federal, provincial, and local. In 2009,
Canadians celebrate Tax Freedom Day on June 6, which means that Canadians will
work until June 5 to pay the total tax bill imposed on them by all levels of government.
Tax Freedom Day in 2009 arrives three days earlier than in 2008, when it fell
on June 9.

Complete study:

Canadians
Celebrate TaxFreedom Day on June 6 (PDF - 97K, 10 pages)The
Canadian tax system is complex and no single number can give us a complete idea
of who pays how much. That said, Tax Freedom Day is the most comprehensive and
easily understood indicator of theoverall tax bill of the average Canadian
family.

June
6, 2009Flaherty Welcomes
Earlier Tax Freedom DayOTTAWA  June 6, 2009  The Honourable
Jim Flaherty, Minister of Finance, was pleased to welcome Tax Freedom Day today,
as it occurs three days earlier in 2009 than in 2008. Calculated each year by
the Fraser Institute, Tax Freedom Day marks the day to which the average Canadian
had to work to pay their total tax bill. In 2009, the Fraser Institute has calculated
that Tax Freedom Day is todayJune 6th. In 2008, Tax Freedom Day fell on
June 9th.Source:Finance Canada

---------------------------

Counterpoint:

Tax
freedom? What a lot of rubbish.Only
the Fraser Institute could see it as a bad thing that we spend less of our
income on basics like food and shelter than we used toBy Andrew Potter
May 28, 2009Tax freedom? What a lot of rubbish.What is it about springtime
that makes anti-government types go light-headed? (...) Listening to the relentlessly
shrill right-wing rhetoric, youd forget that any Canadians ever derived
a single benefit from their tax dollars. (...) Only the Fraser Institute could
see it as a bad thing that we spend less of our incomes on basics like food and
shelter than we used to. (...) Indeed, with its mix of dopey populism and economic
illiteracy, the anti-government right finds itself uncomfortably close to the
anti-market left. Both are peddling economic half-truths and outright fallacies
in the service of their competing but ultimately mirror-image ideologies. The
main difference of course is that while the left is generally expected to be economically
illiterate, the right is supposed to know better. Their brand is economics, you
might say. That is why, when it comes to the rhetorical strategies of Canadas
libertarian movement, it is hard to avoid concluding that the deception is deliberate.Source:Macleans
Magazine

Tax Freedom Day: A Cause for Celebration
or Consternation?By Sheena Starky, Economics DivisionSeptember
18, 2006HTML
versionPDF
version (108K, 13 pages)"(...) critics question the usefulness
of the Tax Freedom Day indicator since it considers only the tax burden without
regard to the benefits received in exchange."- includes links to online
related resourcesSource:Virtual
Library[ Parliament
of Canada ]

Earth to Flaherty:
What part of "deeply flawed and misleading"don't you get?

---------------------------

Tax
Freedom Day - from Wikipedia, the free
encyclopediaTax Freedom Day is the first day of the year in which a nation
as a whole has theoretically earned enough income to fund its annual tax burden.
It is annually calculated in the United States by the Tax Foundationa Washington,
D.C.-based tax research organization. Every dollar that is officially considered
income by the government is counted, and every payment to the government that
is officially considered a tax is counted. Taxes at all levels of governmentlocal,
state and federalare included.(...) Many other organizations in countries
throughout the world now produce their own "Tax Freedom Day" analysis.
According to the Tax Foundation, Tax Freedom Day reports are currently being published
in eight countries. Due to the different ways that nations collect and categorize
public finance data, however, Tax Freedom Days are not comparable from one country
to another.

-----------------------------

'Corporate
welfare bums' cost Canadians $182-billion: reportBy
Eric BeauchesneDecember 10, 2008OTTAWA -- Canadians have handed out more
than $182-billion -- or $13,639 per taxpayer -- in business subsidies, bailouts
and loans over the past dozen years, a right-wing think tank says in an attack
on what a former NDP leader coined as "corporate welfare bums." The
report from the Fraser Institute, however, comes as an entire industry is holding
out its had for billions more in financial aid from taxpayers as the economy slumps
into recession.Source:The National
Post

Complete report from The Fraser Institute:

Corporate
welfare: Now a $182 billion addictionA fiscal update on business subsidies
in Canada(PDF - 104K, 8 pages)December 2008 When the Fraser
Institute published the first study on corporate welfare one year ago, the tally
between April 1, 1994 and March 30, 2004 amounted to $144 billion. That was the
amount Canadian governments distributed to businesses in the form of subsidies
from federal, provincial, and municipal treasuries (i.e., taxpayers) over the
10-year period. One year later, and with two more years of data available, that
figure has climbed to over $182 billion for the 12 years between 1994 and 2006.

The Fraser Institute and the Flat Earth Society
By Larry Brown, National Secretary-Treasurer
Ottawa (3 Sept. 2009)
Pointing out that the Fraser
Institute has released a perverse study ignoring established
facts in order to make its case is a bit like pointing out that the
sun rises in the east. Its kind of self-evident. But the institute's
latest bit of silliness is over the top even for the notoriously fact-averse
Fraserites. In a report released in late August [ Labour
Relations Laws in Canada and the United States, 2009 Edition
] comparing labour laws in Canada and the U.S., the institute argues
that our labour laws are too tilted in favour of unions.
This imbalance is a problem because, it claims, empirical
evidence from around the world indicates that jurisdictions with more
flexible labour markets enjoy better labour market performance.
Empirical evidence? Its possible. There actually is a Flat Earth
Society claiming to prove that the earth is flat. And some people still
claim to have seen Elvis alive. But most people expect proof of a theory
to be based on a bit more substance.
Source:National Union of Public and General
Employees (NUPGE)

A Cautionary Tale:

Here's an excerpt from the conclusion of the above
article:
"(...) Of course, the Fraser Institute has received millions of
dollars from the Donner Canadian Foundation and the Max Bell Foundation.
These groups are known for their devotion to right-wing ideological
causes in Canada, such as anti-union laws, for-profit health care, private
schools and the private delivery of social services. The Fraser Institute
also routinely collects money from big oil and gas companies, such as
EnCana and Sabre Energy, and big pharmaceutical companies, such as Pfizer.
One could suggest that the Fraser Institute, therefore, is only doing
what its sponsors want, irrespective of the facts. That might suggest
that this report was deliberately slanted to reflect the views of its
right-wing corporate sponsors and once more attack laws that protect
employees. But lets be fair to the Fraser Institute. If you believe
the world is flat you arent going to venture out to the edge for
fear of falling off."
---According to the Fraser Institute website's Who
We Are page, "[T]he Fraser Institute is a registered non-profit
organization. We depend entirely on donations from people who understand
the importance of impartial research and who support greater choice,
less government intervention, and more personal responsibility."

After I finished giving my head a shake about Fraser's
status as a registered non-profit organization, I had to smile (y'know,
the jaundiced smile...) when I read the words "impartial research".
How can research be touted as impartial, I wondered, when it's funded
by the big corporations that stand to benefit most from 'supportive'
research? [Never mind - it's a rhetorical question...]
Ya gotta dance wit de one dat brung ya, eh...

The reference to Big Pharma and Pfizer in the above
NUPGE excerpt reminded me of a surprising (to me, at least...) CBC report
back in the mid-nineties stating that the Fraser Institute was endorsing
not only the legalization of marijuana in Canada, but also its regulation
and taxation, based on a June 2004 study entitled Marijuana
Growth in British Columbia, funded by
the Fraser Institute.
[ See also Fraser
Institute study calls for legal pot (June 2004) - CBC ]
After reading the Fraser study, though, I concluded that it was perfectly
logical for the Fraser Institute (Motto: "A free and prosperous
world through choice, markets and responsibility") to favour
an option that reduced government control over people's lives. Because
that's what Fraser and their kindred libertarian spirits (Donner, Max
Bell, etc.) are all about --- getting government out of people's faces
and reducing taxes.

When I saw the reference to Pfizer in the NUPGE article,
I was curious what Fraser was saying about the legalization of pot these
days. Supporters of legalized pot have long maintained
that the biggest barrier to legalization is the sustained pressure on
government by several industries that are concerned about the impact
on their sector if hemp in all its forms (including marijuana) is made
legal. Given the increasing volume of evidence and testimonials about
the medicinal advantages of marijuana over traditional medicine for
treatment of certain conditions and illnesses, it stands to reason that
big drug companies like Pfizer would have the required motivation to
lobby government against any form of decriminalization of pot. Indeed,
when I went to the Fraser Institute's home page while writing this and
did a search for "marijuana", the most recent content on the
subject from Fraser is the 2004 study that advocated legalization. According
to the CBC story, Fraser issued a second press release the same day,
to emphasize that the recommendation to legalize pot were from the author,
not the Institute. Gee, I wonder how long it took the folks at Pfizer
to contact Fraser to demand the second release to distance themselves
from the views of the author...

Suffice to say that 2004 (the year of the pot study
and recommendations) appears to be the last time Fraser dared say anything
substantive about marijuana on their site. Funny thing about that.
(Now I need a Valium, a coffee and a smoke.)

[Aside: The issue of decriminalization of marijuana
is one of those 800-lb gorillas - like abortion, universal day care
and the death penalty - that cut across political party lines and that
can polarize a roomful of social advocates OR a meeting of the Canadian
Taxpayers' Federation.]

So what's the "cautionary" part of all
of this?
1. Be wary of websites that describe themselves or their work as "impartial".
2. Be wary of sites that strive for a free and prosperous world through
choice, markets and responsibility.

The
Fraser Institute: Manitoba Rated as Canada's Most Generous Province but Data
Shows Americans Are Far More GenerousPress
ReleaseDecember 8, 2008VANCOUVER -- Manitoba continues to
be Canada's most generous province, according to the Fraser Institute's annual
generosity index. The report, Generosity in Canada and the United States: The
2008 Generosity Index, shows that Manitoba has the highest percentage of tax-filers
among all provinces donating to registered charities (28.1 per cent). The total
amount donated is also the highest in Canada at 1.14 per cent of total income
earned in the province.

Taxes
and human purposeDecember 9, 2005By Neil Brooks"(...)
In support of their vision of the future, business interests and right-wing political
parties keep warning us about the terrible legacy we are leaving our children
in the form of a national debt and a bloated public sector. In fact, the much
worse legacy we are in danger of leaving our children if we decrease taxes and
continue to diminish the role of government in our collective lives is a fractured
and divided society, without a sense of itself or its collective responsibility,
and in which the economic elite is ever more able to defend itself politically.
This would be a truly unjust and truly irresponsible legacy to leave our children."

Tax Freedom Day: A Cause for Celebration or
Consternation?By Sheena Starky, Economics DivisionSeptember 18,
2006HTML
versionPDF
version (108K, 13 pages)"(...) critics question the usefulness
of the Tax Freedom Day indicator since it considers only the tax burden without
regard to the benefits received in exchange."- includes links to online
related resourcesSource:Virtual
Library[ Parliament
of Canada ]

Tales
from the Mouth of the Fraser: Unfounded LiabilitiesDebt Monster's
Gonna Getcha!!By Marc Lee*, Progressive
Economics Forum Blog"(...) Total liabilities are estimated over 100
years. (...) Whats missing from their scary picture? The uncounted income
we will have in the future. Even if one accepts that their calculations are useful
on the expenditure side, they are meaningless without the context of projected
future income. And we should expect income to grow  in absolute dollars,
and in per capita real terms."Source:Progressive
Economics ForumThe Progressive Economics Forum aims to promote the development
of a progressive economics community in Canada. The PEF brings together over 125
progressive economists, working in universities, the labour movement, and activist
research organizations.

* Blogger Marc Lee's is
one of several "voices of reason" from the Progressive Economics Forum
(PEF). I heartily recommend a visit to the PEF website and blog for a strictly
non-corporate interpretation of Canada's economic and social policies. I particularly
enjoy it when PEF economists offer reality checks as common-sense counterpoints
to the slanted studies of the Fraser Institute...Good on you, Marc and PEF!!

----------------------------------------------------------------

Government
subsidies and handouts to business cost each Canadian taxpayer $1,295News
ReleaseNovember 21, 2007VANCOUVER, BCCanadians provided business
with $19 billion in subsidies in 2004, the equivalent of $1,295 from each Canadian
taxpayer, according to a new report released today by independent research organization
The Fraser Institute. The 2004 figure was almost double the $10.3 billion governments
doled out in business subsidies in 1995. Taxpayer-funded subsidies to business
totalled almost $144 billion between 1995 and 2004 (the most recent year for which
data is available), the equivalent of $11,030 per tax payer (all figures adjusted
for inflation to 2007 dollars).

Government
Lovers: Paid by Canadian Governments and Taxpayers (PDF file -
293K, 25 pages)November 2007This study presents information about the
size of government in Canada by accounting for the number of Canadians who are
paid by governments as civil servants and beneficiaries of social insurance programs.
It supplements the annual Tax Freedom Day studies published by The Fraser Institute
to track the size of Canadian governments and the fiscal burdens they impose on
Canadians.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Average
Canadian family spending more money on taxes than on food, clothing and household
combinedNews ReleaseApril 16, 2007Vancouver,
BC - The average Canadian family spends more money on taxes than on necessities
of life such as food, clothing, and housing, according to a study from The Fraser
Institute, an independent research organization with offices across Canada. The
Canadian Consumer Tax Index, 2007, shows that even though the income of the average
Canadian family has increased significantly since 1961, their total tax bill has
increased at a much higher rate. In 1961, the average Canadian family earned an
income of $5,000 and paid $1,675 in total taxes -- 33.5 per cent of its income.
In 2006, the average Canadian family earned an income of $63,001 and paid total
taxes equaling $28,311 -- 44.9 per cent of its income.

Canadian
Consumer Tax Index, 2007"The Canadian Tax system is complex and
there is no single number that can give us a complete idea of who pays how much.
That said, The Fraser Institute annually calculates the most comprehensive and
easily understood indicator of the overall tax bill of the average Canadian family:
Tax Freedom Day. This Alert examines what has happened to the tax bill
of the average Canadian family over the past 45 years. To determine the changes,
an index of the tax bill of the average Canada family, the Canadian Consumer Tax
Index, is constructed for the period 1961-2006."

Counterpoint:

The
Fraser Institute updates this index annually, based on its Tax Freedom Day information.
There's no analysis of this year's index available online yet because it was just
released on April 16, but Neil Brooks, a professor at York's Osgoode Hall Law
School in Toronto who teaches tax law and policy, looked at last year's numbers
and came to a very different conclusion.

"Brooks
takes on the Fraser Institute's accounting in a paper for the Canadian
Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA), a think-tank that plows the other side
of the political field.(...) As a portion of our total economy, taxes consume
only slightly more today than they did in 1975, according to statistics kept by
the Organization
of Economic Cooperation and Development. So, revolt if you want, but remember,
in government as in all consumer goods, there is a large element of getting what
you pay for."Source:Y-File
- (York University's Daily Bulletin)April 21, 2006

Manning
and Harris Call for Downsizing of Government; Reduced Taxes and Spending Key
to Economic FreedomNews ReleaseThe Fraser InstituteNovember
20, 2006Toronto, ON - As Ottawa readies its economic update for release this
week, now is the ideal time to move forward on reducing spending, cutting taxes
and eliminating provincial trade barriers, Preston Manning and Mike Harris say
in a new policy paper released today, Building Prosperity in a Canada Strong and
Free. The government plays too large a role in the Canadian economy and
thats hindering our growth. We call on Canadian governments to cut governments
share of the economy to 33 per cent from its current 39 per cent over the next
five years. That alone will save Canadian taxpayers almost $400 billion over five
years and spur increased prosperity, Manning said.

Tories
not right wing enough according to Harris, Manning November 20,
2006OTTAWA - If Preston Manning and Mike Harris had their way, the Harper
Conservatives would be more conservative. The Reform party founder and the former
Ontario premier are calling on the federal government to implement massive tax
reforms, cut the size of government, strip away regulations governing businesses
and individuals and rein in spending. Among other things, Ottawa should slash
the corporate tax rate in half and eliminate the cap on Registered Retirement
Savings Plan contributions, says a paper by Manning and Harris, to be released
today by the right-wing Fraser Institute.Source:Canada.com

Canadian
Government Debt 2006:A Guide to the Indebtedness of Canada and the Provinces"Canadian
government debt stands $2.7 billion with each taxpayer owing $171,000. (...) Largely
due to increases in program obligations, in 2003/2004 federal, provincial, and
local liabilities added up to $171,032 for each Canadian taxpayer or $85,525 for
each Canadian citizen."Source:Fraser
Institute

Related
Link from the Canadian Union of Public Employees:

A
six step plan for the Fraser InstituteNovember 14, 2006The
Fraser Institute just released its report on Canadian Government Debt 2006,
designed to create public alarm about rising levels of government debt and push
for severe cuts to health and social spending. The report, which claims that each
Canadian taxpayer owes $171,032 in federal, provincial and local liabilities,
is a typical Fraser Institute cocktail of alarmist "facts", sober sounding
language, misleading analysis, opaque calculations, quarter truths, significant
omissions and wildly overreaching policy lessons.Source:Canadian
Union of Public Employees

NOTE: With due respect
for a great effort, CUPE's six steps for Fraser amount to wishful thinking ---
they include a public disclosure by the think tank about the funding it receives
from the drug and insurance industries, a recognition of its penchant for distorting
the truth in its reports and a demonstration of "a modicum of integrity and
honesty" in its reports, and - well, you see what I mean about wishful thinking.
Click on the six-step plan link above to read the text of the entire plan...

Canadians
Celebrate Tax Freedom Day on June 26thNews ReleaseJune 24, 2005"Vancouver,
BC - This year, Canadians start working for themselves on June 26th. According
to The Fraser Institutes annual Tax Freedom Day calculations, Canadians
worked until June 25th to pay the total tax bill imposed on them by all levels
of government."By Jason Clemens, Director of Fiscal Studies, and Niels
Veldhuis, Senior Research Economist

Dont
believe the hype: Whats really behind the Fraser Institutes Tax
Freedom DayNews ReleaseJune 16, 2005"OTTAWAEach
summer the Fraser Institute announces the arrival of 'tax freedom day': the day
when Canadians allegedly stop 'working for the government' and start 'working
for themselves.' A study by Neil Brooks, released today by the Canadian Centre
for Policy Alternatives, takes a closer look at Tax Freedom Day and finds that
to arrive at this politically loaded and heavily-reported date the Fraser Institutes
calculations understate the income of Canadians, overstate their taxes and misuse
the concept of averages."

--------------------------------------------------------------NOTE:
The Tax Freedom Day concept is not a concoction of the Fraser Institute --- follow
the Google.ca web and news search results links below to see similar themes from
The Tax Foundation
in the U.S. and the Adam Smith Institute
in the U.K.

Tax
Freedom Day: A Cause for Celebration or Consternation?By
Sheena Starky, Economics DivisionSeptember 18, 2006HTML
versionPDF
version (108K, 13 pages)"Each year, typically in June, Canadian
media recognize the arrival of Tax Freedom Day, the day on which Canadian families
with two or more individuals are purported to have earned sufficient income to
pay their total tax bill to all levels of government for the entire year, and
, therefore, to be able to "start working for themselves." Critics claim
that the notion of Tax Freedom Day is misleading and is calculated using a flawed
methodology.(...) While the idea of Tax Freedom Day is intuitively appealing
and media-friendly, the concept does not enjoy unanimous support in Canada or
in other countries where similar reports on Tax Freedom Day exist. (...) More
fundamentally, critics question the usefulness of the Tax Freedom Day indicator
since it considers only the tax burden without regard to the benefits received
in exchange."- includes links to nine related resourcesSource:Virtual
Library[ Parliament
of Canada ]

---

New
Study Warns Against Expansive Welfare Policies in OntarioNews ReleaseDecember
7, 2004"Toronto, ON - A new study, Welfare Reform in Ontario: A Report
Card released today by The Fraser Institute, gives Ontario praise for its
previous welfare reforms but warns that these policies may be under threat. 'Ontario
has been a leader in Canadian welfare reform by focusing on employment and diverting
potential welfare recipients to alternatives,'said Sylvia LeRoy, policy analyst
at the Institute and co-author of the study. 'However, last week, the Ontario
Government received a report by Liberal MPP Deb Matthews [see below] which recommended
abandoning many of those reforms and returning to policies that were in place
pre-1995. Such policies had disastrous effects, including the doubling of welfare
use between 1985 and 1995, increasing from 5.2 percent of the population in 1985
to 12.4 percent in 1995 and a substantial increase in welfare spending', she continued."

Complete
Fraser Institute report:

Welfare Reform in
Ontario: A Report Card (PDF file - 524K, 53 pages)December 2004 -
examination of welfare policies in Ontario since 1985, "evaluating the welfare
reforms initiated under the newly elected provincial government in June 1995.
These will be compared with reforms of welfare policies in the United States,
which have proven abundantly successful in reducing dependency, increasing employment
and earnings of welfare leavers, and lowering poverty rates, as well as with reforms
of welfare policies undertaken by other Canadian jurisdictions.- the evaluation
of Ontario's welfare reforms is based upon "six principles that research
has found to play a prominent role in effective welfare reform" - these principles
are: Ending the entitlement to welfare - Diversion - Immediate work requirements
and sanctions - Employment focus - “Making work pay” - Competition
for the administration of welfare and for program delivery.

It's
important to expose oneself to opposing views on issues as delicate as welfare
reform and social justice --- it makes for healthy debate and broader perspectives.
That's why, from time to time, I link to reports from organizations that have
a different interpretation than mine of society's ills and how to cure them. The
Fraser Institute, a Vancouver conservative think tank / lobby group, is one such
organization whose site I visit occasionally. Sometimes, though, the left-leaner
in me finds it difficult to post links on my site to reports such as this one
(the Ontario welfare reform report card) as if it were the Gospel Truth, without
including a rebuttal or a counterpoint.

Welfare Reform in Ontario:
A Report Card rates Ontario's reforms against the Fraser Institute's five
"principles of effective welfare reform", all of which are focused on ending or
severely curtailing welfare entitlement, on ensuring that work is always more
attractive than welfare, and on putting both the administration and delivery of
welfare up for competitive bidding from the non-profit and private sectors. All
of these principles are consistent with the Fraser Institute's view that American
welfare reforms are a model for Canada. Not surprisingly, there is not one principle
that refers to adequacy of income and employment supports, nor to health or social
indicators.

Two observations and a few recommended
readings for folks who read the Fraser report (and perhaps even for those who
wrote it):

1. Canadian and American welfare systems
are different from one another, a fact that Fraser wilfully and consistently
ignores in its reports. Unlike the Canadian welfare system, the Temporary Assistance
to Needy Families (TANF) program excludes both single people and childless
couples, who must apply to the national Food Stamp program and to residual programs
where they live (if there are any such programs, which is not always the case),
as well as people with disabilities (who must apply under the separate American
Social Security program. In Canada, singles and childless couples make up close
to 60% of the total welfare caseload and households headed people with disabilities
account for about a third of the total caseload. These are just a few of the more
significant reasons why Canadian welfare shouldn't be compared with American programs
under TANF.

2. Welfare time limits are successful? - one of
the Fraser Institute's principles of effective welfare reform is "Ending
the entitlement to welfare". The Fraser report speaks of the success of
the American welfare time limits and, to a lesser extent, the BC welfare
time limits. In the case of the American time limit policy, it's still
too early to determine the long-term impact of the time limits on welfare
recidivism and labour market attachment (see the link to the Welfare information
Network studies below), and in the case of British Columbia, perhaps someone
should tell the Fraser Institute that the two-years-out-of-five welfare
entitlement policy was effectively disabled back in February of 2004.
On second thought, perhaps the authors should check this editorial from
the Fraser Institute:

BC’s
U-Turn on Welfare Reform Spells DisasterEditorial (Vancouver Sun,
February 16, 2004) By Jason Clemens, Sylvia LeRoy and Niels Veldhuis"In
a disastrous U-turn on welfare reform, the BC Government de-legitimized what was
one of Canada’s most important social welfare reforms to date; a limit that
capped the amount of time employable adults could collect welfare to 2 out of
every 5 years. Late on Friday afternoon, February 6th, the BC Liberals announced
a series of new exemptions to the time limits, including one that exempts anyone
abiding by their work plan. The policy change effectively nullifies the time limit
rule and speaks more to the government’s immediate political concerns than
any genuine concern for those still struggling to make the transition from a life
of welfare dependence to one of self-sufficiency."

Are
Welfare Rates Too Low? (PDF file - 741K, 32 pages)[See p. 26]The
amount that society gives to the poor in the form of last-resortsocial assistance
programs is fundamentally a political choice.by Chris SarloSource:Fraser
Forum - July 2004

Every so often I visit the Fraser
Institute's website to see the latest bumph from the fiscal and social conservative
faction of Canadian society. When I perused the table of contents of the Institute's
latest issue of the Fraser Forum (the "source" link above), I found
this article by Chris Sarlo, poster boy for the Fraser Institute's ongoing campaign
for the wider use of absolute poverty measures in Canada (vs. the StatCan Low
Income Cutoffs).

The premise of this article is that
in Canada, "aside from the single employable category, recipients income
is reasonably close to the poverty line in most cases."My reaction: perhaps
true, but only if you're using the calorie-from-starvation budget numbers of the
Fraser Institute...

The National Council of Welfare's
2002 edition of Welfare Incomes is the source of some of the figures in
the table that's part of the Fraser Institute article. The source of the figures
in the table is cited as "National Council of Welfare, 2002; and calculations
by the author."

In fact, only the first column
in the Sarlo article is from the Council, and it's from Welfare Incomes 2002.
Here's a link to the Welfare Incomes 2002 fact sheet where you can find the estimated
income figures used in the Fraser article:http://cnb-ncw.gc.ca/en/publications/pub-119.htmlWhen
I compared the figures from both sources, I realized that the Fraser article had
substituted its own "Basic Poverty Needs Line" for the Council's use
of the StatCan Low Income Cutoff.

Mr. Sarlo and
the Fraser Institute have the right to use their absolute income levels instead
of the Low Income Cutoffs - their levels do, after all, show that everyone on
welfare is near the poverty line except employable singles (thus reinforcing their
view).

What I find objectionable is Sarlo's use
of the absolute numbers without documenting this more precisely in the source
of his table. In the entire text that accompanies the table, there is no definition
of "Basic Poverty Needs Line" - in fact, the author prefers to use the
short form "poverty line", as if repeating it often enough will lull
people into equating the numbers in his article with the other poverty line we
keep hearing about, LICO. I suspect that some people who read the Fraser article
will be wondering why we need to raise welfare rates when all clients except singles
are already receiving welfare rates that appear to be close to or even higher
than the poverty line.It's because Fraser switched the numbers.

They're
not using the same poverty line. And they didn't tell us. Shame.

Fraser
Forum February 2004- articles include : The Art of Fish Management - Some
Basic Insurance Concepts - The Cost of Canada's Employment Insurance System -
Why We Need a Return to Experience Rating in EI - Revealing Research on Auto Insurance
- The Problem with Public Health Insurance - Poverty Among Seniors in Canada -
The 2004 Budget Performance Index - Exploring Potential, Results from the 2003
- 2004 Fraser Institute Annual Survey of Mining Companies - Ontario's Labour Reforms
Ill Advised - New Health Reform Policy in Slovakia Reminds Canada of a Lesson
it has Yet to Learn

Poverty Among Seniors in Canada
(PDF file - 94K, 2 pages) by Chris Sarlo"The claim that almost one
in five seniors in Canada is currently impoverished has as much credibility as
the latest sighting of Elvis."

Complete Fraser Forum (PDF
file - 542K, 28 pages) For those with high speed connections, this PDF file
contains the complete Fraser Forum (rather than broken down into the links above).

A
Rising Tide Lifts All Boats (PDF file - 100K, 2 pages)by Niels Veldhuis
and Jason Clemens"Does economic growth benefit those with the lowest
incomes? Research seems to show that it does."

The
National Homelessness Initiative (PDF file - 99KB)by Chris Sarlo
"What specific successes has the National Homelessness Initiative achieved
in its first three years to warrant its renewal?"

Source:Reasons
for Economic OptimismJanuary 2004 Fraser Forum(Table of Contents
page)- click on the link above to access other articles in this issue of the
Fraser Forum, on the Canadian standard of living compared with other advanced
countries, education in Alberta, electoral reform in BC, Alberta and Ontario as
models for tax reductions elsewhere in Canada, media literacy and the installation
of left-wing politics into the school curriculum, after the Albert Advantage,
Paul Martin's Expenditure Review Committee, and more...Complete January
2004 Fraser Forum (PDF file - 634K, 32 pages)

The
Relativity of LICO (PDF file - 82K, 2 pages)by Chris Sarlo"A
relative line, such as LICO, may be useful as a marker of what income is required
to keep from falling behind the mainstream, but is not useful at all as a measure
of what income people need to avoid being 'straitened.'"Source:November
2003 Fraser ForumNOTE: In the November Fraser Forum, you'll also find links
to the following articles:- Ontario's Best Education Premier (Poll says Ontarians
disagree with Liberal plan to roll back education credits)- Could Alberta's
Provincial Police Return by 2012?- A Council of the Federation (PDF file -
94K, 2 pages)- Dismal Consequences from Canada's Regional Programs- How
Feasible is an Alberta Pension Plan?- The Potential and the Penalty for Real
Health Care Reform- Constituting Democracy in Alberta:A Centennial Proposal-
Some Comments on Economic Freedom in Bangladesh- The Case for Privatizing
BC's Forests- False Failures- Revisiting Reference Pricing in BC's Pharmacare-
Florida's Proof: Testing the Effects of CompetitionClick on the November link
above to access links to each article, or on the link below to download the entire
issue.Complete Fraser Forum (PDF file - 489KB, 30 pages)

The Market Basket Measure
of Poverty (PDF file - 93K, 2 pages)by Chris Sarlo "The
"market basket measure" of poverty may be a victory for the basic needs
approach this author developed, but celebrations are premature."Source:Fraser
Forum - April 2003

Saskatchewan
Welfare Reform Lacks a New Vision for Social AssistanceNews ReleaseFraser
Institute January 16, 2003 "Saskatchewan has failed to fundamentally
reform welfare and must implement major changes to reduce caseloads, increase
the employment and earnings of welfare recipients, and decrease provincial spending
on social services, says a new study, Welfare in Saskatchewan: A Critical Evaluation,
released today by The Fraser Institute."NOTE: The news release contains
the authors' seven recommendations for reforming the delivery of social services
in Saskatchewan. For the record, I agree with and support recommendation number
six - and only recommendation number six (improvement of earnings exemption provisions).

Even though I disagree
fundamentally with the Fraser Institute's view on the "success" of welfare
reforms in Saskatchewan, I feel it's important to share this information about
how one faction of Canadian society feels about welfare reforms and social programs
in general.

The authors state that "[S]askatchewan
politicians have chosen not to more fundamentally reform the welfare system,
as other Canadian jurisdictions have", referring specifically to
the deep welfare cuts in Alberta (1993), Ontario (1995) and BC (2002),
provinces that they offer as models for Canadian welfare reform. Ironically,
the National Council of Welfare (NCW) applauded the Saskatchewan government
back in 1997 for exactly the same reason in Another Look at Welfare
Reform : "Compared with some other provinces, Saskatchewan
had done better for its welfare recipients by doing nothing." I wrote
those words myself, in my role as principal researcher for the NCW's welfare
reform report, and I'm sure that even the harshest social critics of the
government of Saskatchewan wouldn't argue that point about welfare in
their province in the mid-to-late 1990s.

From the
National Council of Welfare (NCW):

---*NOTE
: The National Council of Welfare closed its doors and shut down
its website at the end of September 2012.
For more information, see http://www.canadiansocialresearch.net/ncw.htm
The links to the three reports below are functional because the
files are copied to my web server.
---

Over the years, the Council has produced many
reports on poverty and welfare, but there are three that stand
out in my mind as milestone reports on the history of welfare
in Canada, at least since the 1980s.

1. 1987Welfare in Canada: The
Tangled Safety Net (PDF - 2.7MB, 131 pages)
November 1987Tangled Safety Net examines the following issues in Canadian
social assistance network of programs:
* Complex rules * Needs-testing * Rates of assistance * Enforcement
* Appeals * Recommendations
This report is the first comprehensive national analysis of social
assistance programs operated by the provincial, territorial and
municipal governments. These programs function as the safety net
for Canadians and are better known by their everyday name welfare.

2. 1992Welfare Reform
(PDF - 2.8MB, 61 pages)
Summer 1992
This report is an update of the 1987 Tangled Safety Net,
but it presents information by jurisdiction rather than by issue
- covers all provinces and territories.

3. 1997Another Look
at Welfare Reform (PDF - 6.75MB, 134 pages)
Autumn 1997
- an in-depth analysis of changes in Canadian welfare programs
in the 1990s. The report focuses on the provincial and territorial
reforms that preceded the repeal of the Canada Assistance Plan
and those that followed the implementation of the Canada Health
and Social Transfer in April 1996.
[Proactive disclosure : I did the research for, and wrote the
provincial-territorial section of, this report while I was on
a one-year secondment to the Council. Gilles ]

Source:
National Council of Welfare
Established in 1969, the Council is an advisory group to the Minister
of Human Resources and Skills Development Canada (originally the
Minister of Health and Welfare Canada). The mandate of the Council
is to advise the Minister regarding any matter relating to social
development that the Minister may refer to the Council for its
consideration or that the Council considers appropriate.

I suspect that the difference in perspective
is that the NCW represents the interests of disadvantaged Canadians while
the Fraser Institute speaks for the rich and the corporations
Read about both organizations:

National
Council of Welfare ("...advises the Minister [of Human Resources
Development Canada] on the needs and problems of low-income Canadians and on social
and related programs and policies which affect their welfare...")Funding
for the NCW : the federal government.

About
the Fraser Institute - "Founded in 1974 at a time when many Canadians
believed that government should be the principal source of growth and development
in the economy, the Institute has helped bring about a considerable shift in public
opinion in recognition of the importance of market competition."Funding
for the Institute: "The majority of the Institutes revenues are derived
from the donations of its members, and from research foundations."(from
the Institute's 2001
annual report - PDF file - 860K, 32 pages)

November
2002 Fraser Forum - Taming Media Myths"Fraser Forum is
a monthly review of public policy in Canada, with articles covering taxation,
education, health care policy, and wide range of other topics. Forum writers are
economists, Institute research analysts, and selected authors, including those
from other public policy think tanks."

Here
are just a few of the 16 titles in this month's Fraser Forum; click on the link
above to access all articles in this issue.

November
Questions and Answers (PDF file - 133K, 3 pages) - public sector
employment figures : number of employees in 1991 and 2001 in eight different
areas of the public sector for all of Canada + total number of public sector employees
and average wage information by province/territory for 1991 and 2001

Judges
versus the Media (PDF file - 97K, B) by Sylvia LeRoy"Media
attention to judicial decisions has increased many-fold since the introduction
of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms."

The
Media & Globalization Myths (PDF file - 105K, 3 pages)"Even
the Prime Minister isn't immune to the mythology that income disparities between
rich and poor nations are widening."

Poverty
and the Federal Government (PDF file - 115K, 2 pages) by Chris
Sarlo"My own measure [of poverty] is one of so called absolute
poverty and attempts to reveal serious material deprivation (hunger, inadequate
housing, deprived living conditions)not a lack of social comforts."

Related
Links:By coincidence, I was doing some cleanup of broken links this weekend,
and I came across these two short pieces from a few years ago by David Ross, former
Director of the Canadian Council on Social Development. Read the Sarlo article
above, then read the counterpoint by David Ross.

October
2002 Fraser Forum - "Do Judges Make Good Policy?" "Fraser
Forum is a monthly review of public policy in Canada, with articles covering taxation,
education, health care policy, and wide range of other topics. Forum writers are
economists, Institute research analysts, and selected authors, including those
from other public policy think tanks."Here are a few of the titles
in this month's Fraser Forum (click on the link above to see all articles in this
issue)Activist Judges Attack Common Sense Revolution (PDF file -
92K, 3 pages)-"Activist judges have used the Charter of Rights to
roll back cost-cutting policy initiatives in health, welfare, and labour relations."
- "judicial attack" against the Mike Harris legacy - incl. references
to the Falkiner ("spouse-in-the-house")case

The
UN's Right to Welfare (PDF file - 103K, 2 pages) - "A
right-to-welfare court challenge in Quebec could affect us all."-
Ref. to the Gosselin
case ("...the real legacy of this case will be that litigants may turn
to documentary evidence from international human rights instruments, nowhere legislated
in domestic law, to push for ever greater economic benefits and state resources.
Why work when you can sue?")

Labour-saving
Devices in Poor Households (PDF file - 86K, 2 pages) "Are
those defined as poor far behind the rest of society in the use and enjoyment
of labour-saving devices?"[Gilles' comment: Petty. I knew
before reading the article that author Chris Sarlo would equate ownership of one
kitchen labour-saving device or another with affluence - or at least non-poverty.
Petty.]

Other articles in the October Forum
cover topics such as the Nisga'a Treaty, the Court Challenges Program, Kyoto,
drug benefit programs, government spending, democratic reform (constitutional
constraints), market forces and Canada's highways, measuring the size of government
and more.Source : Fraser Institute
- "Competitive Market Solutions for Public Policy Problems"

BC
Welfare Reform Receives a B : Province Leaps to Forefront of Intelligent
Welfare Reform and Sets New Standard for Canadian WelfareThe
Fraser Institute October 21, 2002 "BCs recently announced
welfare reforms have catapulted it beyond any Canadian jurisdiction and into the
realm of reform-minded US states such as Wisconsin, says a new report,
Welfare Reform in British Columbia: A Report Card, released today by the Fraser
Institute."News
Release and SummaryWelfare
Reform in British Columbia: A Report Card (PDF file - 208K, 30 pages)Source:Fraser
Institute - "Competitive Market Solutions for Public Policy Problems"The Fraser Institute was founded in 1974 to redirect public
attention to the role markets can play in providing for the economic and social
well-being of Canadians.-----------------------------------Wow
- it's not often that the conservative Fraser Institute is on the same wavelength
as the British Columbia social advocacy community, but there ya go, folks.Here's
what authors Chris Schafer and Jason Clemens say about incentives to work: "The
government should move to immediately re-instate earnings exemptions as they existed
prior to the change. Furthermore, the government should consider enhancing the
opportunities to make work pay by extending earnings exemptions further.""Hear,
hear!" say the social advocates --- but then, the Fraser report also gives
the BC government high marks for being the first Canadian jurisdiction to set
a time limit to welfare eligibility [max.
two years out of every five years] regardless of personal circumstances or
the economic situation --- definitely not a popular feature with those who work
with and speak for the most disadvantaged in BC...-----------------------------------Re.
Wisconsin:Wisconsin
Studies (W-2) - The Institute for Research on Poverty (IRP) of the University
of Wisconsin has a section of its Welfare
Reform website that includes links to over a dozen studies on the outcomes
and impacts of welfare reform in Wisconsin. Pick one or two, read them and decide
for yourself how successful Wisconsin's reforms have been...Source : Institute
for Research on Poverty (IRP)----------------------------------Caveat
:

"The
welfare caseload composition of Canadian provincial welfare rolls and US state
welfare rolls varies on a number of different levels. While female single- parent
families comprise the bulk of US welfare caseloads, in Canada that figure is approximately
29 percent (CCSD, 1998). In addition, Canadian caseloads also consist of disabled
persons, whereas in the US disabled persons fall under alternative support programs
not categorized as welfare. - Footnote #4, page 25

There are indeed a number
of differences between the current Canadian and American social safety nets -
too many to cover in a newsletter, and certainly enough that the Fraser Institute
should have considered posting the disclaimer/caveat just a bit more prominently.
For example...- poor single people and childless couples in the U.S. can't
even apply for Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), and states decide
individually whether or not to grant residual welfare to applicants without dependants
- 35 percent of the total U.S. caseload is "child-only cases", i.e.,
kids outside the parental home (in Canada, the vast majority of these kids are
covered by child protection) - Canadian welfare is broader than TANF plus
the Food Stamp Program plus Medicaid...- and so on.

Canadian equivalent to
the 4th annual TANF report to Congress :None. There is no requirement
within the framework of the Canada Health and Social Transfer for a report by
government to Parliament on the administration of the welfare portion of the CHST
(or any other portion, for that matter) by provincial and territorial governments.
Pity...

Canada
Spends the Most on Health Care Among OECD Countries but Ranks Low on Key Health
IndicatorsNews
Release (August 19, 2002) "Canada spends more on health care
than any other industrialized country providing universal access yet winds up
near the bottom of the heap in quality of service says a new study, How Good is
Canadian Health Care: An International Comparison of Health Care Systems."Executive
Summary ( PDF file - 540K, 6 pages)Report
- links to the executive summary and six sections of the report

Related
Links:The
Fraser Institute loves bad health care newsCorporate lapdog Michael
Walker strikes againSeptember 19, 2002"Vancouver
- Corporate Canada's faithful lapdog is back again. Michael Walker of the Fraser
Institute has published yet another study knocking public medicare and praising
corporate health care as an alternative. His "new" annual study of hospital
waiting times across Canada says things are getting steadily worse for Canadians
cueing up for treatment."(...)"...the Fraser Institute, whose
sole reason for existence is to blacken the name of all things public and whitewash
everything corporate"Source : National
Union of Public and General Employees

Saskatchewan
blasts biased Fraser Institute studySeptember 20, 2002"Regina
- Saskatchewan is disputing hospital waiting-list figures compiled by the Fraser
Institute, the right-wing, corporate-funded "research" outfit by Michael
Walker in Vancouver. A new report by the public-sector-bashing institute says
Saskatchewan has the longest surgical waiting list in the country  more
than twice the national average. Dr. Peter Glynn, the chair of Saskatchewan's
Surgical Care Network takes exception to the numbers released by the Fraser Institute.
His group was set up to oversee waiting lists for surgery. He says the actual
waiting time for most surgeries is less than half of what is cited in the Fraser
Institute study."Source : National
Union of Public and General Employees

July
2002 Fraser Forum -"Tax Freedom Day" "Fraser
Forum is a monthly review of public policy in Canada, with articles covering taxation,
education, health care policy, and wide range of other topics. Forum writers are
economists, Institute research analysts, and selected authors, including those
from other public policy think tanks."Here are some of the titles
in this month's Fraser Forum (click on the link above to see all 16 articles in
this issue) -Canadians
Celebrate Tax Freedom Day on June 28 (PDF file - 450K, 6 pages) -
"Over time, Tax Freedom Day arrives earlier. But progress is very slow."
- Rising Capital Flows and Falling Corporate Tax Rates ("High
tax rates are difficult to sustain in the new globalized economy.")-
The Corporate Capital Tax: Canada's Most Damaging Tax ("...by
far the most destructive and growth-inhibiting tax imposed by Canadian governments.")
- Is
Child Poverty Declining? (PDF file - 58K, 2 pages) - "The
federal Human Resources Minister has credited the National Child Benefit with
reducing child poverty. Her claim should not be taken seriously."
-
Don't Tamper with Welfare Success (PDF file - 93K, 2 pages) - "There
is a move afoot in the US to roll back the initial 1996 reforms that were so successful
in ending welfare as Amerians knew it."- Tug-of-War: The Security
vs. Sovereignty Dilemma - Medical Research and Media Hype- Just Say No
to Agricultural Subsidies: Ten Reasons to Dump Farm Aid - More Guns, Less
Crime? What Canada can Learn from Gun Control Around the World - Freedom and
Security not Mutually Exclusive - Government on the GrillSource
: Fraser Institute - "Competitive
Market Solutions for Public Policy Problems"

Economic
Freedom of the World: 2002 Annual ReportJune 2002"This
6th global economic freedom report, by James Gwartney and Robert Lawson, ranks
123 nations on 37 variables with data back to 1970. Economic freedom is based
on personal choice, voluntary exchange, freedom to compete, and protection of
the person and property. This requires the rule of law, property rights, limited
government intervention, freedom to trade, and sound money."- incl.
links to eight PDF files : Introduction and notes - Economic Freedom of the World
- Index of Patent Rights - International Tax Competition - Country Data Tables
(Albania to Zimbabwe)

"Fraser
Forum is a monthly review of public policy in Canada, with articles covering
taxation, education, health care policy, and wide range of other topics. Forum
writers are economists, Institute research analysts, and selected authors, including
those from other public policy think tanks."

*NOTE
: On this page, you'll also find links to the following issues of the Fraser Forum
: April 2002 (Environmental Questions for the 21st Century) - March 2002
(Creating a North America Frontier) - February 2002 (Government in the
Medicine Cabinet)Fraser
Institute proposes an alternative to the United Nations' Human Development Index Media Release 24 October 2001 Canada ranks sixteenth on
the Fraser Institute's Measuring Development: An Index of Human Progress,
released today. This new publication provides a more complete view of the recent
history and current state of development throughout the world than does the United
Nations' often-quoted Human Development Index. The Fraser Institute's Index
of Human Progress ranks the United States first, Switzerland second, Luxembourg
third, Denmark fourth, and Japan fifth. Canada ranked sixteenth in 1999 out of
128 countries. - Measuring
Development: An Index of Human Progress (PDF file - 521K, 63 pages)

Surveying
US and Canadian Welfare Reform(PDF file -
838K, 68 pages)August 2001Executive
SummaryIntroduction1.
Historical development of welfare in the United States2.
PRWORA—the end of welfare as Americans knew it3. American
states—experimentation and innovation4. The results
of PRWORA and state welfare reforms5. Welfare in Canada6. Provincial welfare reforms7. Recommendations
for CanadaGlossaryReferences

The
Adequacy of Welfare Benefits in Canadaby Joel
Emes and Andrei KreptulApril 1999-
Compares welfare benefits in 1998 by province with Christopher Sarlo's Basic Needs
Lines. Includes information on earnings exemptions and special assistance,
plus Pre-Tax Wage Equivalence charts explaining how much a working person would
have to earn to end up with the same annual "net income" as an income assistance
(IA) recipient.Executive
SummaryComplete
Report (PDF file - 427K, 30 pages)

Canadians
Celebrate Tax Freedom Day on June 29June
26, 2001Canadians finally start working for themselves
on June 29. According to The Fraser Institute's annual Tax Freedom Day calculations,
announced today. Canadians worked until June 28 to pay the total tax bill imposed
on them by all levels of government. This represents a five day improvement over
last year when Tax Freedom Day fell on July 4.

But see also :

The
Tax Freedom DazeJune 2001Every
year, the ultra-conservative Fraser Institute pronounces Tax Freedom Day--the
day when Canadians (finally) stop "working for the government" and start "working
for themselves". Tax Freedom Day is, without a doubt, a clever and media-savvy
ploy. That people actually derive benefits from government services in exchange
for the taxes they pay is conveniently swept under the ideological carpet. Instead,
the Fraser Institute suggests that up to a certain date, the government takes
all of your income, burying it in some distant mineshaft never again to see the
light of day, and thus stripping away your ability to be truly free.Source : Canadian
Centre for Policy Alternatives

Fraser Forum Online The site redesign appears to
have done a real number on the Fraser Forum. The old site had a single link where
visitors could select monthly Forum issues back to 1991 - over a thousand articles.
With the new site, you either select a recent issue from the right-hand side of
the Fraser home page or use the search engine for older issues. I haven't figured
out how far back they go in the new site. I wasn't impressed with the Advanced
Search feature. Damn those database sites.

"The
C.D. Howe Institute is Canadas leading independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit
economic policy research institution. Its individual and corporate members are
drawn from business, universities and theprofessions."

<begin
"nonpartisan" rant>I have to laugh (not the genuine ha-ha laughter,
but the jaundiced one) when I see the expression "nonpartisan" in the
description of the Institute (from the C.D. Institute blurb in the report). They're
about as non-partisan as their West Coast brothers-in-arms, the Fraser Institute.
They didn't fool Wikipedia, though --- here's their take on the
Institute: "The C.D. Howe Institute is a Canadian economic and social think
tank based in downtown Toronto, Ontario. It is non-profit, officially non-partisan,
and a registered charity with the Canada Revenue Agency. However, it is funded
mainly by large corporations, and generally advocates market-oriented economic
policies such as tax cuts.(bolding added)" [Source]I
like the way Wikipedia adds the word "officially" as a nuance to the
Institute's own description of itself as nonpartisan...</end "nonpartisan"
rant>

- Publications
List - close to 100 C.D. Howe Institute reports (in
PDF format) going back to 1996. Subjects include the Social Union, the CHST, the
National Child Benefit and Employment Insurance, to name but a few...

Selected site content:

Poverty
Rate Among Single-Parent Families Cut
by Half over Decade: C.D. Howe Institute (PDF - 60K, 2 pages)
Communiqué
June 24, 2010
The poverty rate among the two million Canadians living in lone-parent families
has fallen by more than half over a decade, according to a C.D. Howe Institute
study released today. In Reducing Lone-Parent Poverty: A Canadian Success
Story, Professor John Richards, the Roger Phillips Scholar in Social Policy,
finds this decline largely reflects smart social program reforms that led to
a dramatic increase in employment income among these families.

The complete study:

Reducing
Lone-Parent Poverty:
A Canadian Success Story (PDF - 538K, 20 pages)
By John Richards
"From 1996 to 2007, the poverty rate among the two million Canadians living
in lone-parent families fell by more than half  from nearly 50 percent
to just over 20 percent. What did Ottawa and the provinces do right? And what
comes next?
(...) In mid-1990s, most provinces adopted 'tough love' initiatives that rendered
welfare access more difficult for those classified as employable, a category
including most single parents. Accompanying the 'tough love' were 'soft love'
initiatives..."

Source:C.D. Howe Institute
The C.D. Howe Institute is a leading independent, economic and social policy
research institution. The Institutes individual and corporate members
are drawn from business, universities and the professions across the country.

---------------------------------

Counterpoint:

Lone
Parent Success Story Not Because of Tough LoveBy Armine Yalnizyan
June 24, 2010"John Richards tells us 'tough love' was the right
public policy stance for governments to take in the mid 1990s. (...) Richards
tells us that the tightening of access to welfare and the imposition of workfare
was the kick-in-the-butt that lone parents needed to move themselves out of
poverty...."

Armine thinks otherwise.
And she backs up her views with facts.
Click the link above to read the rest of her comment about John Richards' study.
(I personally think the Richards study is just a little bit paternalistic, misogynistic
and discriminatory. But that's just me, eh...)

Armine concludes her blog entry: "As the Age of Austerity
approacheth, let us hope that reports like this help define the limits of tough
love, and provide incentives to gear up the many poverty reduction strategies
in Canada. It is both achievable and affordable to reduce poverty for every
group in Canada. Now that would be a success story worth writing about."[ Hear, hear! Gilles ]

Dramatic
Decline in Welfare Dependency in Canada, Several Factors Responsible: C.D.
Howe Institute (PDF - 40K, 3 pages)CommuniquéJune
19, 2008Canada has experienced a dramatic decline in welfare dependency since
the early 1990s, according to new study by the C.D. Howe Institute, which notes
that Canadas Social Assistance (SA) dependency rate fell by approximately
half from the early 1990s to 2005, taking the countrys rising population
into account. In The Welfare Enigma: Explaining the Dramatic Decline in CanadiansUse
of Social Assistance, 1993-2005, authors Ross Finnie and Ian Irvine provide a
nationwide analysis of the factors responsible for the truly remarkable decline,
and draw implications for policymakers.

COMMENT: It appears that every eleven
years or so, the C.D. Howe Institute, minions of the business, university and
professional elite, trot out another earth-shattering study about how reducing
access to welfare results in fewer people on welfare. Well, Whoop-De-Doo. That's
about as informative an observation as "It's better to be rich and healthy
than poor and sick."

Falling
Poverty Rates, Rising Employment among PoorReflect Social Policy Success:
C.D. Howe Institute (PDF file - 34K, 2 pages) CommuniquéOctober
18, 2007Anti-poverty initiatives over the last decade in Canada have been
successful, mainly by increasing employment among the poor, according to a new
study released by the C.D. Howe Institute. In Reducing Poverty: What has Worked,
and What Should Come Next, author John Richards finds that policies that target
employment for the poor, along with improved labor market conditions, have been
key to reducing poverty in Canada.

John
Richards on Tough Love and PovertyCommentary by Andrew
Jackson on John Richards'Reducing Poverty: What has Worked, and What Should
Come NextNovember 28, 2007"(...) His [Richards'] basic argument
here is that tough love welfare reform in the sense of
deep cuts to welfare rates and increased social worker policing of recipients
to impose work incentives, especially in Alberta and Ontario, worked
in that it reduced welfare recipiency and poverty rates and increased employment.
He is much less enthusiastic about soft love earnings supplements
for the working poor because they result in high marginal tax rates for those
just above the poverty line. The basic message here is that the punitive cuts
of Harris in Ontario and Klein in Alberta were effective in reducing poverty by
driving welfare recipients into work." (...) What John emphatically does
not do is compare poverty rates between cyclically equivalent years, ie 2005 compared
to the late 1980s. As detailed in the just-released Campaign 2000 report card
for 2007, that time comparison is much less flattering to recent policy, and shows
little or no progress on the child poverty front. In summary, the so-called tough
love approach of Klein and Harris may have reduced welfare rates but it
deepened poverty for those who remanied on welfare, and - in the context of an
improved job market - shifted many from the ranks of the welfare poor to the working
poor and near poor. Thats hardly cause for great celebration..."

Tough
love gets results, lifting more Canadians out of povertyOctober
19, 2007Tough love works. True, the disconcerting images of poverty in Canada
-- shabby panhandlers who camp out on upscale sidewalks, and the urban wasteland
that is the Downtown Eastside -- might be more in your face than ever. But, hidden
from view in homes that look a little better than they used to, the lot of most
lower-income Canadians has been steadily improving for a decade or more.Source:Vancouver
Sun

Riposte from John Stapleton*:

"The
negative mention of MISWAA recommendations in Richards' paper is interesting insofar
as he intimates that the recommended changes are not required in a robust economy
that creates low income jobs that low income adults can easily access. One of
MISWAA's central principles was that of fairness. We were not ultimately looking
at what civil society and governments can get away with in a good economy - we
wanted to ensure that the right programs and policies were in place for the inevitability
of tougher times at the trough of economic cycles while ensuring that all members
of society are able to benefit from our economy, regardless of the times."----------------------------------*John
Stapleton was Research Director of the Task
Force on Modernizing Income Security for Working Age Adults (MISWAA)[The
C.D. Howe commentary disses the recommendations found in the final
report of the Task Force (PDF file - 282K, 68 pages).]

The
debate over Canada's poverty lineNovember
12, 2007By Armina LigayaCanada is one of the wealthiest countries in the
world. Yet even as the nation is in the midst of an economic boom, there are still
those who struggle to buy life's necessities. Past and current governments have
implemented a myriad of strategies to help the country's most vulnerable. They
range from boosting social assistance to, at the more punitive extreme, restricting
employment insurance. Debate continues over what's the best approach to eradicate
poverty, assuming that is in fact a reachable goal. Source:CBC
News Online

The
Paradox of the Social Union Framework Agreement (PDF file - 58K, 11
pages) Backgrounder March 2002 "The agreement is worth preserving
for a further three years with the aim of strengthening its provincial principles.
If it ends up providing cover for major unilateral federal spending in provincial
areas, however, the agreement should be scrapped."

The
Dynamics of Poverty in Canada: What We Know, What We Can Do(PDF file, 193K, 59 pages)Ross FinnieSept. 28, 2000- explores the dynamics
of Canadians’ poverty experiences from 1992 to 1996 using the recently developed
Longitudinal Administrative Database. By following individuals over time, the
database allowed analysis of movements into and out of poverty, including those
related to changes in family status.

Canada
West Foundation"The Canada West Foundation
(CWF) is a [Calgary-based] non-partisan, non-profit research organization active
in economic and public policy studies. Founded in December of 1970, Canada West
grew out of the "One Prairie Province" Conference held in Lethbridge, Alberta
earlier that year. The consensus developed at the conference was that research
on western Canadian concerns should be continued and expanded. This led to the
formation of the Canada West Council, which then developed the mandate for the
Canada West Foundation."

Regional
Approaches to Services in the West: Health, Social Services and EducationFebruary 2002- "provides an overview
of the different approaches being used in the four western provinces for health,
social services and education. The main provincial similarities and differences
are also compared. Finally, due to their increasing political, economic and social
importance, the large western cities are briefly considered within the context
of regional approaches to provincial services."

Enhanced
Urban Aboriginal Programming in Western CanadaJanuary
2002"Almost as many Aboriginal people live in urban
areas of Canada as do not, and in every city in Canada, Aboriginal people are
a visible presence – particularly in western Canada. To inform ongoing decision-making
and public debate, a better understanding of the policy program landscapes for
urban Aboriginal people is needed."

- Click on Publications
on the main page to download full copies (PDF format) of many CWF reports, including
the following :(only the first report below is
hyperlinked - use the above link to get to the rest)

Where
Are They Now?: Assessing the Impact of Welfare Reform on Former Recipients (1993-1996)- Press Release + link to PDF version - September 1997Welfare
Reform in Alberta: A Survey of Former RecipientsThe
Safety Net and Seniors in AlbertaSocial Services for
Persons With Disabilities in AlbertaRestructuring of
Social Services: The Impact on Women in AlbertaAlberta's
Children: Issues, Programs and RestructuringMaking Ends
Meet: Income Support in AlbertaIssues and Options for
Change: Social Services for the 21st CenturyIncome Support
in Canada: A Statistical Profile

Institute
On Governance (IOG)"The Institute On Governance
is a non-profit organization with charitable status founded in 1990 to promote
effective governance. From our perspective, governance comprises the traditions,
institutions and processes that determine how power is exercised, how citizens
are given a voice, and how decisions are made on issues of public concern."The IOG site is worth a visit if you're interested in any of
the following issues:Citizen Participation - Aboriginal
Governance - Building Policy Capacity - Accountability and Performance Measurement
- Information and Communications Technology and Governance - Youth And GovernanceThe site contains a wealth of information and many online publications,
for example...Publications:
Aboriginal Governance - links to over three dozen PDF reports

policity.com
(The Institute On Governance) "policity was created [by the Institute
on Governance and FreeBalance] in the spring of 1999 as a site dedicated to governance
issues and practices. Its mission is to illuminate and support the processes by
which citizens can be engaged in issues of community concern and in the formulation
and implementation of public policy."August 2002: "This
web site was developed as part of the Institute On Governance's past work on Citizen
Participation. While it is no longer being updated, we continue to host sections
of the site as a public service to fellow practioners."

Policy
options (free online magazine)"Policy Options is Canada's premier
public policy magazine. Its goal is to encourage an informed debate on the important
public policy issues of today, and of tomorrow. In each edition, short articles
on the immediate issues that dominate the headlines are combined with in-depth
analyses of longer-term issues that are certain to emerge on the policy horizon.
Policy Options is published ten times per year."

Below,
you'll find links to just two of the dozen-plus articles from a sample issue of
Policy Options. Other articles in the same (April 2008) issue covered topics including
the 2008 federal budget, NAFTA, the Castonguay Report on health care in Quebec,
Canada's Afghan mission and much more. Click the link above to access all past
issues of Policy Options.

Guaranteed
annual income: why Milton Friedman and Bob Stanfield were right
(PDF - 172K, 6 pages)By Hugh SegalApril 2008[Abstract] In this article,
former IRPP president Hugh Segal considers the merits of a guaranteed annual income
or a negative income tax, an idea whose time may never come, but which always
generates a good debate. It?s a concept where thinkers on the left and right have
found some common ground, from conservative economists such as Milton Friedman
in the United States, to Red Tories such as Robert Stanfield in Canada. "If
it is done right," Segal argues, "instituting a basic floor income could
diminish federal-provincial and labour-management tensions" and could even,
"over time, reduce the net burden of state spending while increasing aid
to, and the privacy and dignity, of those who fall behind."

"This
just in: surpluses across the board" (PDF - 163K, 3 pages)By
Thomas J. CourcheneApril 2008[Abstract] The achievement of budgetary surpluses
in Ottawa and in all provinces and territories simultaneously was 60 years in
the making. This brief commentary on budgetary federalism adapts the informative
charts in Budget 2008 and traces the fiscal/budgetary fortunes of the two levels
of government over the past two decades. The near collapse of provincial finances
in the wake of the 1995 budget has now been offset by a huge influx of federal
cash transfers (Canada Health Transfer, Canada Social Transfer and equalization)
and by resource revenues. When combined with federal tax cuts, the result is that
the excess of provincial over federal revenues has never been larger.

The
Use of Family Friendly Workplace Practices in Canada (PDF file - 526K,
42 pages)September 2006The increase in two earner households has changed
the structure of the labour market, presenting employees, government and firms
with new challenges. These changes have spurred an increasing interest innew
workplace practices and policies that may respond to the requirements of the New
Economy. Research in the area covers a variety of fields in social sciences and
has mainly focused on the availability of benefits to workers with families. However,
a natural question that has only received passing attention is to what extent
these benefits are being used by families.News
Release (PDF file - 35K, 2 pages)

Working
for Working Parents:The Evolution of Maternity and Parental Benefits in Canada
(PDF file - 218K, 42 pages)May 2006Table of Contents: * Introduction
* Setting the Stage: The Changing Labour Market and Social Context for Families
with Young Children, 1973-2002 * A Short History of Maternity and Parental
Benefits Policy in Canada * Sample Benefit Calculations for Five Historical
Periods and the Quebec Program * Statistical Evidence on Benefit Receipt*
What Are the Goals of the Federal Program and How Well Are They Being Achieved?*
Where to From Here? Discussion and Recommendations

Fiscal
Dispute among Governments in Canada Is Damaging to the Cause of Health Care Reform"On
January 27, the IRPP and the Institute of Intergovernmental Relations released
Money, Politics and Health Care: Reconstructing the Federal-Provincial Partnership,
edited by Harvey Lazar and France St-Hilaire. The contributors to the volume maintain
that continual federal-provincial squabbling over health care funding has hampered
the process of reform needed to ensure the quality and sustainability of health
care for future generations. Moreover, this inability to address the real problems
in the system has in itself become detrimental to the proper functioning of the
federation."News
Release (small PDF file) January 27, 2004Report: Money,
Politics and Health Care: Reconstructing the Federal-Provincial PartnershipOrder
a copy of this bookChapter
on vertical fiscal imbalance (PDF file - 625K, 54 pages)

-------------------------------------------------

Paul
Martin's Briefing Book - from the Institute for Research on Public
Policy (IRPP)The December 2003 issue of Policy Options from IRPP includes
(among other content) 17 articles with advice to the incoming Prime Minister on
a range of issues from air quality to U.S.-Canada relations, written by a number
of social policy experts from the Left and the Right.

Here
are two sample articles:

Will
the Prime Minister Displace the Finance Minister?Paul Martin's Social Policy
for a "New Era" (PDF file - 206K, 5 pages)December 2003Jane
Jenson "Many of the social policy changes that the new prime minister
will have to overcome are of his own making : the emphasis on labour market participation
and on children, a preference to use the tax system as the delivery mechanism,
which limits the government's role to providing income transfers and has largely
constrained its influence over policy, and a poisoned intergovernmental atmosphere."

Aboriginal
Policy - Time to Rethink? (PDF file - 187K, 5 pages)John Richards"...despite
some progress and large sums of money, Aboriginals' socio-economic status remains
desperately worrying, 'the most serious social scar on Canadian society', and
the exaggerated stress on 'otherness' at the heart of the current policy is partly
responsible for the slow pace of progress."

Windows
of opportunity: social reform under Lester B. Pearson(PDF
file - 568K, 12 pages)by Jim Coutts"...in only five years of two
minority governments Pearson enacted the Canada-Quebec Pension Plan, The Canada
Assistance Plan, the Guaranteed Income Supplement and Medicare, all keystones
of the modern social security system."Source:Policy
Options: November 2003 Issue[Theme: Corporate Governance]NOTE:
in this issue of Policy Options, you'll also find links to over a dozen
articles on the following topics:- A call for a culture of values, not just
rules - from the corner office to the boardroom- From carrots to sticks: restoring
investor confidence in Canada- A road too far - compliance at the expense
of performance?- The importance of good governance for confidence in Canadian
capital markets- Une saine gouvernance pour préserver nos avoirs collectives-
The new private-sector ombudsmen - From the blame game to accountability in
health care- Multinational governance and worker rights in the global village-
Loving the market or supporting business- Socrates does Canadian electrical
policy- Symbolism vs. economics: the loonie vs. the greenback- National
missile defence: it is rocket science- À propos du financement des
universités et des droits de scolarité au Québec- Performing
the news - not the facts, but the story- Ranking prime ministers of the last
50 years: IRPP's Web visitors speak- Book Excerpt: Understanding Canadian
Defence- Book Review: Geoffrey Kelley reviews Understanding Canadian Defence
by Desmond Morton- Will Martin touch our new economic Constitution?[ Institute
for Research on Public Policy ]

Council
of the Federation SeriesOctober 15, 2003"As
part of a joint initiative with the Institute for Research on Public Policy in
Montreal, the Institute of Intergovernmental Relations is launching a series of
twelve commentaries on the Council of the Federation. The series title is Constructive
and Co - operative Federalism? A Series of Commentaries on the Council of the
Federation. The papers, prepared by leading federalism and public policy
experts across Canada, can be downloaded in PDF format."

2003
Special Series on the Council of the Federation - on this page, you'll
find links to all reports released to date in this series, including:- Getting
Things Done in the Federation: Do We Need New Rules for an Old Game?- The
End of a Model? Quebec and the Council of the Federation Alain Noël-
Counsel for Canadian Federalism: Aboriginal Governments and the Council of the
Federation- Some Personal Reflections on the Council of the Federation Bob
Rae- A Convention on the Canadian Economic and Social Systems- Council
of the Federation Founding Agreement Provincial and Territorial Premiers-
Intergovernmental Councils in Federations- The Council of the Federation:
From a Defensive to a Partnership Approach- Expanding the Partnership: The
Proposed Council of the Federation and the Challenge of Glocalization- Managing
Interdependencies in the Canadian Federation: Lessons from the Social Union Framework
Agreement- The Council of the Federation: Conflict and Complementarity with
Canadas Democratic Reform Agenda- Quebec and Interprovincial Discussion
and Consultation- The Health Council of Canada Proposal in light of the Council
of the Federation- Council of the Federation: An Idea Whose Time has ComeSource:Canadian Network of Federalism StudiesInstitute
of Intergovernmental Relations [IIR] (Queen's University)Institute
for Research on Public Policy (IRPP)

IRPP Study: Child Tax Benefit
Ineffective in Addressing Child PovertyJune 10, 2003 "An exhaustive
examination of Canadas family policy concludes that recent federal and provincial
government initiatives are misguided and have not efficiently addressed the problems
of child poverty. 'The Child Tax Benefit is a dead end'assert Pierre Lefebvre
and Philip Merrigan in 'Assessing Family Policy in Canada: A New Deal for Families
and Children,' released today by the Institute for Research on Public Policy."News
Release (small PDF file)Summary
(small PDF file)Complete
Study (PDF file - 395K, 100 pages)

Policy
Options"Canada's premier public policy magazine"This link
offers short summaries of the articles in the current issue, ordering information
and links to back issues. You can access the complete text of all articles
in every issue of Policy Options in PDF format back to 1997 by clicking
Back Issues (near the top of the Policy Options page), then on a particular
year and month

Sample content from a few recent issues:

February
2003 IssueIncludes the following five analyses of the Romanow report:-
"Romanow-A Defence of Public Health Care, But is There a Map for the Road
Ahead?" by Antonia Maioni- "Le défi de la santé dans
un contexte électoral : redonner aux Québécois unsystème
public de santé à la hauteur de leurs attentes" by Jean Charest-
"L' « épineuse » question d'André Burelle et le
rapport Romanow" by John Richards- "He Said, She Said: The Debate
on Vertical Fiscal Imbalance and Federal Health-Care Funding" by France St-Hilaire
and Harvey Lazar- "Health Care as a Commodity" by Joseph Heath

November
1998: THE SOCIAL UNION19 articles on various
aspects of the Social Union, from provincial/territorial perspectives to fiscal
considerations. Contributors include Monique Jérôme-Forget, Thomas
Courchene, Keith Banting, John Richards and Roy Romanow, to name but a few.
Follow the links to read abstracts and to download PDF copies of all articles(For related links, go to the Canadian Social Research Links
Unofficial Social Union
Links page)

Empowering Reforms Needed for Parliament's
Contribution to Budgetary Process"May
14, 2002 - In a new Policy Matters paper released today by the Institute for Research
on Public Policy (IRPP), Peter Dobell and Martin Ulrich analyse how Parliament
carries out three roles in the annual budget process  representing citizen
interests, empowering the government and scrutinizing the governments performance."Complete
Study (PDF file - 66K, 24 pages)

Negative
Economic Impact of Aging Exaggerated, Says New IRPP Study"March
11, 2002 - Many assessments of the effects of an aging population on the standard
of living of Canadians and our public finances are too pessimistic. Population
aging can also have positive consequences, says Marcel Mérette, economics
professor at the University of Ottawa, in a new study published today by the Institute
for Research on Public Policy (IRPP)."Complete
Study (PDF file - 487K, 28 pages)

Montreal
Economic Institute
The Montreal Economic Institute (MEI) is an independent, non-profit, non-partisan
research and educational institute. It endeavours to promote an economic approach
to the study of public policy issues. The MEI's mission is to propose original
and innovative solutions for the crafting of efficient public policies, using
successful reforms applied elsewhere as models.The MEI studies how markets function
with the aim of identifying the mechanisms and institutions which foster the
prosperity and long-term welfare of all the individuals which make up our society.
The MEI is the product of a collaborative effort between Montreal-area entrepreneurs,
academics and economists. The Institute does not accept any public funding.
[ Excerpt from Who
Are We ]

Selected site content:

Who Spends More: Left or Right?
(PDF - 3.4MB, 4 pages)http://www.iedm.org/files/note0413_en.pdf
By Michel Kelly-Gagnon and Vincent Geloso
April 2013
Economic Note showing the absence of correlation between the governing party's
ideology and the evolution of public spending as a share of GDP.

Abstracthttp://www.iedm.org/43572-who-spends-more-left-or-rightPublic policy debates are often coloured by ideological
preconceptions. For example, we expect political parties on "the left"
to have a tendency to increase public spending when they are in power, and parties
on "the right" to have a tendency to reduce it. This perception clearly
stems from official statements that emphasize different goals. But what is the
reality?

Canadian politics just got turned upside
down [Who Spends More: Left or Right?]http://brighterlife.ca/2013/03/27/canadian-politics-just-got-turned-upside-down/By Kevin Press
March 27, 2013
Fundamental to our understanding of democratic politics across the developed
world is that conservative parties stand for relatively low levels of government
spending, while those on the left of the political spectrum are prone to higher
spending. A new study, released yesterday by the Montreal Economic Institute
(MEI), blows a hole through that conventional wisdom.
(...)
MEIs study examined government spending in Canada, Quebec and the U.S.,
dating back to the Pierre Trudeau, Robert Bourassa and Richard Nixon administrations
respectively. In all three cases, reads the report, it is
actually left-wing governments that most reduced the relative size of government.

Quebeckers
opinion on social assistance payments (PDF file - 89K, 4 pages)
January 2007According to a Léger Marketing poll released today, 80%
of people in Quebec would agree to having social assistance taken away from recipients
who are fit for work and who refuse to take part in job preparation programs such
as studies, training or community work.

Editorial CommentCanadian
and American welfare systems are different from one another, a fact that the Montreal
Economic Institute and its ideological soulmate on the Canadian West Coast, the
Fraser Institute, willfully and consistently ignore in their welfare reform reports.
After reading this short report on how *swell* the American state governments
(along with Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia) have been doing in reducing
their welfare caseloads, I note that the most important bit of text is actually
in a text box on page
2, i.e., "In the United States, financial assistance for adults without
children and without work constraints does not exist at the federal level and
is very limited at the state level."

Unlike
the Canadian welfare system, state welfare programs under the federal Temporary
Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) initiative exclude single people and childless
couples, who must apply to the national Food Stamp program and to residual aid
programs where they live (if there are any such programs, which is not always
the case), as well as people with disabilities (who must apply under the separate
American Social Security program). In Canada, singles and childless couples make
up close to 60% of the total welfare caseload and households headed by people
with disabilities account for about a third of the total caseload. These are just
a few of the more significant reasons why Canadian welfare shouldn't be compared
with American programs under TANF.

What
North American reforms can teach us informs us that in 2002, British Columbia
became the only jurisdiction in Canada to set time limits (24 mo. in any 60-month
period) on social assistance eligibility for recipients who were fit for work.
I guess the author of WNARCTU didn't get a chance to read more recent reports
of her Fraser Institute pals --- in a February
2004 commentary, the Fraser Institute bemoaned BC's "backtracking"
on its welfare reforms, effectively nullifying the time limit rule by exempting
any client who was complying with his/her recovery/action/work plan. The absence
of that bit of info in WNARCTU taints the analysis, no?

Bottom
Line:Canadian and American welfare systems are like apples and oranges.
They shouldn't be compared without situating each system in its appropriate
context.

Social Research and Demonstration
CorporationSRDCs two-part mission is to
help policy-makers and practitioners identify social policies and programs that
improve the well-being of all Canadians, with a special concern for the effects
on the disadvantaged, and to raise the standards of evidence that are used in
assessing social policies and programs

SRDC
Publications - Links to SRDC reports on SSP and on
the Earnings Supplement Project

For more information
about specific SRDC Projects :

* Child
Care Pilot Project...a research project that will evaluate the impacts
of a preschool program on the childrens linguistic and cultural development,
and their readiness to learn

* learn$ave...a
national demonstration of matched savings accounts for poor families to encourage
learning activities and micro-enterprise development

*
The Self-Sufficiency Project...a
test of temporary earnings supplements as a "make work pay" strategy
to support the transition of lone parents from welfare to work

*
The Earnings Supplement
Project...a recent type of a financial incentive in the form of temporary
"earnings insurance" as a way of hastening the re-employment of Employment
Insurance (EI) beneficiaries

Some sample reports...

Final
evaluation report of the Case Coordination Project in Vancouvers Downtown
EastsideFebruary 2009SRDC released its final evaluation report
of the Case Coordination Project (CCP) in Vancouvers Downtown Eastside,
an area with high rates of poverty, substance abuse, poor housing, and unemployment.
The project was designed to determine whether a comprehensive model delivering
one-to-one support to long-term unemployed residents of the Downtown Eastside
could help them return to employment and self-sufficiency. Components of the project
and methods of delivery had to be flexible to meet the changing needs of participants.
The final report presents the findings of the CPP, with details on participants
employment, their outcomes from receiving Income Assistance, and their experiences
with the project. The report also draws conclusions relating to project implementation
and administration, as well as policy implications for similar projects.Source:Learning What Works (February
2009)- the latest issue of SRDC's newsletter

NOTE: the February
2009 issue of Learning What Worksalso includes articles (and links to
related reports) about: * The B.C. AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination)
Early Implementation Report: Addressing academic barriers to PSE (AVID that aims
to increase post-secondary enrolment among Grade 8 students with a B to C average).*
Community Employment Innovation Project (CEIP): A viable alternative for vulnerable
communities and the unemployed* Data from the Community Employment Innovation
Project is available to interested researchers* The Child Care Pilot Project
is extended (testing a preschool daycare service designed to help children master
the French language)* SRDC to evaluate initiatives of the BC Healthy Living
Alliance

Source:Social
Research and Demonstration Corporation (SRDC)SRDC is a not-for-profit
organization, a registered charity, and a pioneer in the use of social experiments
in Canada. SRDCs two-part mission is to help policy-makers and practitioners
identify social policies and programs that improve the well-being of all Canadians,
with a special concern for the effects on the disadvantaged, and to raise the
standards of evidence that are used in assessing social policies and programs.

Learning
What Works Newsletter - May 2008 issueIN THIS ISSUE:* New
report shows communities can help improve local development and capacity *
Developing francophone childrens abilities: Child Care Pilot Project family
workshops * Transition to work for people facing multiple barriers * Does
increased contact with participants improve the ability of surveys to gather evidence?
* SRDC mourns the passing of Arthur Kroeger

Early
results show low-income Canadians can save for their educationNews
Release January 25, 2008A new report released by SRDC presents the 18-month
results of the Individual Development Accounts project learn$ave. The program
has so far yielded positive effects on saving and budgeting, as well as participants
attitudes towards education.

Learning to Save,
Saving to Learn: Early Impacts of the learn$ave Individual Development Accounts
Project, a new report released by SRDC, presents the 18-month results
of learn$ave, a project designed to demonstrate how Individual Development Accounts
can encourage low-income adults to save in order to increase their human capital
by participating in education or training, or starting a small business.

Interim
Results From Major Study Show That Community-Based Work Can Improve Skills and
Social Capital back November 16, 2007 Can community-based
employment help the unemployed develop their transferable skills and social capital?
A major Canadian study released today by the Social Research and Demonstration
Corporation (SRDC) reveals promising results in that respect. "Improving
skills, networks, and livelihoods through community-based work: Three-year impacts
of the Community Employment Innovation Project" presents interim results
from the Community Employment Innovation Project (CEIP), a program designed to
encourage the longer-term employability of participants while supporting local
community development in regions of continuing high unemployment.

Source:
Community Employment Innovation Project...a project evaluating the effects
of community-based employment in the social economy in Cape Breton on the employability
of EI and income assistance recipients and on the five participating communities
themselves

Early
Results From Major Study Show That Communities Can CreateMeaningful JobsNovember
28, 2006Ottawa  Can communities create meaningful work that is an attractive
alternative to Employment Insurance and welfare? A major Canadian study of a new,
innovative program is showing this to be true. Today the Social Research and Demonstration
Corporation (SRDC) is releasing a new report presenting early impacts from the
Community Employment Innovation Project (CEIP), a study of a program designed
to encourage the longer-term employability of participants while supporting local
community development in areas of continuing high unemployment...

NOTE:
I've removed the links below because they were all broken. (The SRDC site has
been updated) However, I've left the text so you can copy a page title that
interests you into the SRDC search engine on the
home page of their website.(Some of the older pages are no longer on the
re-launched site.)

A Literature Review
of Experience-Rating Employment Insurance in CanadaWorking Paperby
Shawn de Raaf, Anne Motte, and Carole VincentMay 2005"This working
paper reviews both the theoretical and empirical literature on experience-rating
unemployment insurance programs. In reviewing the existing research, the paper
identifies a number of lessons learned to determine whether an experience-rated
Employment Insurance (EI) program might, by modifying the behaviour of Canadian
firms and workers, address the magnitude of subsidies some firms receive from
the program year after year or lessen the extent to which claimants frequently
rely on EI benefits."

Can Work Alter Welfare
Recipients Beliefs? (PDF file - 236K, 32 pages) The Self-Sufficiency
ProjectPeter Gottschalk (Boston College)February 2005SRDC Working
Paper Series 05-01NOTE: this is written in economese --- not for the faint-hearted!(For
example: "We find that exogenous increases in work induced by an experimental
earnings supplement led to the predicted change in beliefs.")Source:The
Self-Sufficiency Project

Understanding Employment
Insurance Claim Patterns:Final Report of the Earnings Supplement ProjectMarch 2004"This report brings to an end the Earnings Supplement Project
(ESP), a long-term, multiphase project that was designed to study the reliance,1
especially the frequent reliance, on Employment Insurance (EI) benefits. In 1994
Human Resources and Skills Development Canada (HRSDC) funded ESP to determine
whether a financial incentive could hasten the return to work of individuals who
were receiving EI benefits."Complete report (PDF file - 1.4MB,
77 pages)Executive Summary (PDF file - 294K, 8 pages)

SRDC
Publishes the First Report on the Community Employment Innovation Project:The
Community Employment Innovation Project: Design and ImplementationDecember
12, 2003"This is the first report from the Community Employment Innovation
Project (CEIP). CEIP is a long-term demonstration project taking place in Cape
Breton that is designed to measure the effects, on individuals and on communities,
of providing community-based employment opportunities to the long-term unemployed.
This report presents the basic design of the project, its implementation in the
field, and early observations of implementation issues."Complete report:The
Community Employment Innovation Project:Design and Implementation
(PDF file - 1.1MB, 232 pages)

SRDC Publishes the Final Report on the
Self-Sufficiency Project:Can Work Incentives Pay for Themselves?
Final Report on the Self-Sufficiency Project for Welfare ApplicantsOctober
7, 2003This report presents the final findings from the Self-Sufficiency Project's
Applicant study. It describes the impacts of an earnings supplement on the employment,
earnings, income, and welfare receipt of new income assistance applicants through
the six years since they were randomly assigned to the study.Complete report
(PDF file - 961K, 164 pages)

Learning What Works
(SRDC newsletter) - (PDF file - 1439K, 13 pages)Fall 2003 issue
- incl. the following articles: Can Work Incentives Pay for Themselves? - Why
Should Seasonal Work Be Excluded From EI Coverage? - A Feasible Way to Deliver
Supports to People With Disabilities - Final Call for Research Papers Using the
Complete Data From the Self-Sufficiency Project - Bulletin Board.

Assessing
the Impact of Non-response on the Treatment Effect in the Canadian Self-Sufficiency
Project (PDF file - 274K, 44 pages)October 2003"... investigates
whether there is a bias in the measurement of the Self-Sufficiency Project treatment
effect because up to 20 per cent of the intended sample did not agree to take
part."

Equilibrium Policy Experiments
and the Evaluation of Social Programs (PDF file - 386K, 72 pages)October
2003"...presents a model for evaluating equilibrium
policy experiments, and illustrates the usefulness of this model as a tool for
assessing the impact of social programs by using it to evaluate the Self-Sufficiency
Project (SSP). SSPs reports to date have been subject only to partial equilibrium
experimental evaluations."

The Disability
Supports Feasibility Study: Final Report (PDF file - 460K, 112 pages)June
2003"The Disability Supports Feasibility Study (DSFS) pilot project
provided supports to unemployed people with disabilities to help them find work
and keep working. Unlike many support programs, DSFS did not assess an individuals
need for a particular support. Instead, people with disabilities could purchase
any support they wanted from a list of eligible supports (up to a monthly maximum
expenditure). (...) The study concluded that it was feasible to operate a DSFS-type
program offering disability and employment supports."

Learning
What Works  Volume 3, Number 1 - Winter 2003 (PDF file - 220K, 15 pages)-
incl. What Happens When a Temporary Earnings Supplement Is Withdrawn? The effect
of the cliff on SSP participants - Program Participants Say Thank
You SSP! - Preparing for Tomorrow's Social Policy Agenda

Do
Earnings Subsidies Affect Job Choice? The Impact of SSP Supplement Payments
on Wage Growth (PDF file - 659K, 50 pages)January 2003"This
working paper asks whether wage or earnings supplement programs encourage participants
to move into jobs with greater wage growth or to change jobs more often in order
to raise their wages, and provides an analytical model that identifies the key
causal links between earnings subsidies and wage growth. The paper then applies
this analytical model to data obtained from the Self-Sufficiency Project (SSP)
to see if the SSP data is consistent with what would be predicted from the model."

Preparing
for Tomorrow's Social Policy Agenda : New Priorities for Policy Research and Development
That Emerge From an Examination of the Economic Well-Being of the Working-Age
Population - (PDF file - 1000K, 176 pages)by Peter
Hicks November 2002"In this working paper, author Peter Hicks lays
out how Canadas working population will change in the next five years and
offers a variety of directions policy-makers might take to manage those changes.
The paper is intended to identify the topics that are likely to be on the policy
agenda in this time frame and to propose policy development work that could begin
now in order to prepare for such an agenda. While the paper is primarily about
policies that support the economic well-being of working-age people in the medium-term
time frame, a broad definition of social policy and longer view are discussed."

In
the author's own words: "I attempt to identify the main pressures that are
likely to drive social policy over the next 5 to 10 years (including different
scenarios) and to examine the new policy responses that will likely be needed.
The paper also looks back and tries to situate today's social policy agenda in
the context of recent trends in economic well-being."

Impact
of the Allowable Earnings Provision on EI Dependency: The Earnings Supplement
ProjectNovember 2002 by David Gray and Shawn de Raaf"...provides
an in-depth analysis of the way in which Employment Insurance (EI) claimants combine
the receipt of EI benefits with work"

Learning
What Works newsletter (PDF file - 162K,
11 pages)(Fall 2002)- incl. Leaving Welfare for a Job - new research on
the kinds of jobs SSP participants take after they leave welfare

Learning
What Works : Evidence from SRDC's Social Experiments and Research (PDF
file - 165K, 13 pages)Newsletter Spring 2002- includes a five-page
article entitled The Self-Sufficiency Project After 54 Months ("New Report
Provides a Wealth of Policy Insight and Knowledge")

When
Financial Incentives Pay for Themselves: Interim Findings From the Self-Sufficiency
Project’s Applicant Study(November 2001)This report provides an update to the SPP applicant study,
describing the effects of SSP on applicants’ employment, earnings, income, and
use of income assistance 48 months after participants entered the study.Full report (PDF file - 285K, 66 pages)

When Financial Incentives Encourage Work:Complete 18-Month Findings from the Self-Sufficiency ProjectSocial Research and Demonstration CorporationSeptember
1998- "When tied to a substantial work requirement,
financial incentives can help address three often conflicting goals of welfare
reform: to increase work effort, to reduce poverty, and to reduce welfare dependence.
Financial incentives are not a quick fix, though, and can cost money in the short
run, but the increased cost of financial incentives buys a substantial improvement
in well-being."

Intergovernmental Committee
on Urban and Regional Research (ICURR)Canada's
Local Government Information CentreThe Intergovernmental
Committee on Urban and Regional Research (ICURR) provides a unique and comprehensive
database and lending library on local government. Municipal and other public sector
employees, planners, consultants and academics regularly use ICURR's extensive
information resources. The research and publication program represents a vital
element in the analysis of economic, environmental and planning issues confronting
local governments throughout Canada.

Council
for Canadian UnityThe Council for Canadian
Unity was founded in 1964 with a mandate to "conduct research and studies for
the purpose of educating and informing all persons generally in Canada in a better
understanding of the legal and fiscal structures and the cultural and political
nature of Canada, its provinces and its other civic and government bodies; and
to promulgate the findings and results of such studies and research through public
assemblies, literature and other means of communication throughout the whole of
Canada."

The
Centre for Research and Information on Canada (CRIC)The
Centre for Research and Information on Canada (CRIC), established in 1996, manages
the Council for Canadian Unity (CCU) research and communications activities. It
keeps volunteers abreast of Canadians' thinking by constantly tracking and analyzing
public opinion about the federation.Check out the
Quick guide for links toa plethora of issues

The Canadian
Research Institute for Social Policy (CRISP) is a multi-disciplinary research
organization based at the University of New Brunswick (UNB) in Fredericton. CRISP
is dedicated to improving the effectiveness of social policy in Canada, to help
Canadian communities provide better education and care for their children, and
to contribute to capacity-building efforts in developing countries.

Policy
Research Initiative (PRI) "The Policy Research Initiative's core
mandate is to advance research on emerging horizontal issues that are highly relevant
to the federal government's medium-term policy agenda, and to ensure the effective
transfer of this knowledge to policy-makers. The PRI mandate extends to two ancillary
objectives: to contribute to the strengthening of the federal government's policy
research capacity, and, to create an infrastructure that fosters collaboration
on horizontal policy research."- incl. links to: About The PRI - Research
Projects - Capacity Building - Community Infrastructure - Publications - Events
- Environment and Trade Symposium

Horizons
- April 2006 issue : Work and Life Balance
(PDF file - 553K, 60 pages)Volume 8 - Number 3This issue of Horizons explores
the topic of work-life balance and its related consequences. While a few of the
articles address work-life balance directly, many also speak to some of the fundamental
causes and outcomes of the time-stress numerous Canadians feel.Table of
contents:*Work-Life Balance in an Aging Population
* Time-Related Stress: Incidence and Risk Factors * Self-Employed Womens
Work-Life Imbalance: An Urgent Need for Policy Response * Gender Models for Family
and Work * Informal Caregivers: Balancing Work and Life Responsibilities * Policy
Implications of Delayed Reproduction and Low Fertility Rates * Equality of Opportunity
and Inequality Across the Generations: Challenges Ahead * Changing Nature of the
Family * Lifetime Labour Force Transitions

Sample
content from this issue: (use either of the two links above to access
all of this content and more)

Social Economy: Entrepreneurial
Spirit in Community ServiceThe Government of Canada and the Social EconomyThe
Social Economy in Canada: Concepts, Data and MeasurementThe Social Purchasing
Portal: A Tool to Blend ValuesThe Role of Government in Supporting the Social
EconomyInternational Conference on Engaging CommunitiesCo-operative Membership
and Globalization (Book review)An Analysis of Social Capital and Health Using
a Network Approach: Findings and LimitationsAboriginal Policy Research Conference
2006 (Bookmark)Population aging and life-course flexibility project of PRI
More --- click the link above for links to two dozen articles, reviews, etc.

Source:Policy
Research Initiative (PRI)"The PRI, while conducting independent policy
research projects, is attached to the Privy Council Office through the Plans and
Consultation Branch. The PRI currently has five horizontal research projects:
Population Aging and Life-course Flexibility * New Approaches for Addressing Poverty
and Exclusion * Social Capital as a Public Policy Tool * North American Linkages
* Sustainable Development (Freshwater Management)."

------------------------------------------------------

Encouraging
Choice in Work and RetirementProject Report (1.1MB, 57 pages)October
2005"This report evaluates the extent of the economic risk to society
posed by population aging and specifically the baby boom retirement. It emphasizes
the need to maintain a healthy economy and fiscal prudence, while still respecting
the opportunity and need for people to exercise choice in the best interests of
their families, society, and themselves."

Research
ProjectsThe PRI is currently running five horizontal
research projects:* Population Aging and Life-Course
Flexibility * New Approaches for Addressing Poverty and Exclusion * Social
Capital as a Public Policy Tool * North American Linkages, and * Sustainable
DevelopmentNOTE: on the Research Projects page, you can click on each of the
project names to read a brief description of the project and, in the small box
right next to the title, a link to PRI publications for that particular project.

Other
recent PRI publications - PRI released a number of reports in September
on the following topics:Measurement of Social Capital - Briefing Notes on
Sustainable Development - Social Capital as a Public Policy Tool Project Report
- Social Capital: A Tool for Public Policy (Briefing Note)

Working
Paper Series"...ongoing analytical work developed in relation
to the PRI's horizontal projects" - covers nine working papers, including
two on poverty and exclusion written by staff of Social Development Canada on
poverty and exclusion("What Does It Mean to Be
Poor and Working?" and "The Other Face of Working
Poverty")NOTE: all links on the working paper page point only
to abstracts of the papers; in order to obtain an actual copy of a particular
paper, there's a form that you must complete and send to PRI. Because of some
red asterisks on that form, it looks like you're required to divulge personal
information (name, org, job title) as well as your e-mail address. Then you wait
(&*%$) until someone at PRI receives, reads and responds to your request,
i.e., presumably by sending you a reply with a copy of the requested paper attached.
If you want two or three of the working papers, prepare to repeat the process
two or three times. This sucks.

PRI
Update Spring 2005 (PDF file - 126K, 12 pages)April
2005 Update on PRI's five horizontal research projects: - Population Aging
and Life-Course Flexibility - New Approaches for Addressing Poverty and Exclusion
- Social Capital as a Public Policy Tool - North American Linkages - Sustainable
DevelopmentSource:Policy
Research Initiative (PRI)

Policy
Research Initiative Update - Autumn 2004 (PDF file
- 1MB, 12 pages)September 15, 2004Core Research Projects: - New Approaches
for Addressing Poverty and Exclusion- Social Capital as a Public Policy Tool-
Population Aging and Life-Course Flexibility- Sustainable Development-
North American LinkagesOther Research Activities: Genomics - PRI-Social Science
and Humanities Research Council Roundtable Series - Policy Research Conference:
Exploring New Approaches to Social Policy (Dec/04) - Policy Research Data Group/Data
Gaps Initiative - Policy Research Development ProgramSource:Policy
Research Initiative

---------------------------------------------------------------

Views
on Life-Course Flexibility and Canadas Aging Population
(PDF file - 532K, 51 pages)July 2004PRI ProjectPopulation Aging and
Life-Course Flexibility Results of 10 focus groups held across Canada "to
understand the preferences of Canadians regarding the timing of retirement, and
the allocation of the time devoted to education, care giving, and leisure over
the course of life."

Not
Strangers in These Parts : Urban Aboriginal Peoples (PDF file - 3MB,
281 pages)December 2003"Edited by Professors David Newhouse, Trent
University, and Evelyn Peters, University of Saskatchewan, this volume is a collection
of papers devoted to analyzing the realities of urban Aboriginal peoples in Canada.
It is the first volume in a series of thematic publications of proceedings from
the Aboriginal Policy Research Conference. Held in November 2002, the conference
was co-hosted by Indian and Northern Affairs Canada (INAC) and the University
of Western Ontario (UWO), with the participation of over a dozen federal departments
and agencies as well as four national Aboriginal organizations. The conference
was the largest of its kind ever held, with over 640 Aboriginal community leaders,
academics, and policy-makers coming together to examine and discuss state of the
art research on Aboriginal conditions in Canada."Source:Policy
Research Initiative (PRI)

Urban Aboriginal Strategy"The
Urban Aboriginal Strategy (UAS) was introduced in 1998 to address, in partnership
with stakeholders, the serious socio-economic needs of urban Aboriginal people.
The Strategy is designed to improve policy development and program coordination
at the federal level and with other levels of government. The intent of the UAS
is to reduce the level of disparity that urban Aboriginal people currently face
by better tailoring government programs to the local needs and priorities of Aboriginal
people living in cities."Source:Federal Interlocutor for Métis
and Non-Status Indians[ Privy Council Office ]

Horizons
- newsletter of the PRICheck this page out for links to seven complete
issues of the newsletter from back to July 2002, covering a range of themes like
social sohesion, cities, aging, knowledge transfer, etc.For
each issue of Horizons, you'll find a link to the PDF file and a link to
"Featured Sites" (sites that are mentioned or related to the articles in each
issue)

Sample issue:

North
American Linkages - June 2004"This issue examines some of the challenges
the Government of Canada is facing in its management of our multi-faceted relations
with the United States. Like Ulysses, who had to navigate between Scylla and Charybdis
on the return from Troy to Ithacus, Canada has to steer certain public policies
between twin perils, pursuing a balance between the risk of being engulfed by
its giant neighbour, as a possible result of ill-considered integration, and the
risk of losing important economic benefits if it steers away from North American
integration."Featured authors : André Downs (Policy Research Initiative)
- David Griller (SECOR Consulting) - Madanmohan Ghosh and Someshwar Rao (Industry
Canada) - Shenjie Chen and John M. Curtis (International Trade Canada)

Exploring
the Promise of Asset-Based Social Policies:Reviewing Evidence from Research
and PracticeConference on Asset-Based ApproachesDecember 8-9,
2003Gatineau (Aylmer), Québec"This conference is part of an
interdepartmental research project entitled New Approaches for Adressing Poverty
and Exclusion. It will provide a unique opportunity for policymakers and experts
to examine what we have learned so far from Canadian and international research,
policy and practice on the strengths and limitations of asset-based approaches
(saving programs for individual development, learning, housing, etc.). The goal
will be to stimulate debate and reflection on the potential role of these approaches
in our poverty prevention and reduction policies."Program
details

Frontier
Centre for Public Policy (Winnipeg)"The Frontier Centre for
Public Policy is an independent public policy think tank whose mission is "to
broaden the debate on our future through public policy research and education
and to explore positive changes within our public institutions that support economic
growth and opportunity."

International
Development Research Centre"IDRC is a
Canadian public corporation that works in close collaboration with researchers
from the developing world in their search for the means to build healthier, more
equitable, and more prosperous societies."

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